It is generally imagined that cloth is the colour it appears to be: this is not the case, for the fibres of linen or woollen are hollow like straw, and the art of dyeing them consists (after cleansing the tubes,) of dividing the colouring matter into as minute particles as possible without destroying it as colour, and then introducing it into these tubes or pores. The colour of the linen or woolen always remains the same. Some colouring matter will not of itself stay in either, without a mordant being first introduced, which eagerly attaches it
self to the fibre, as well as possesses a chemical affinity to the colouring atoms.
There is not any body for dye naturally black; but there is a property in galls, sumach, oak, &c. possessing a sort of mordant, to which iron so attaches itself as to give the most permanent black dye, particularly with a little logwood. In writing, however, the pores of the linen or paper are not sufficiently opened for much colour to enter them; therefore gum is used. If animal gluten is substituted, I feel no doubt that it will decay infinitely sooner than gum, more especially if exposed to the least damp.
TIS come-the fulness of that promis'd hour,
When Woman's seed shall break the Serpent's pow'r;
"Tis come-the time, by prophecies foretold,
When He, "whose goings forth were from of old,"
Should leave his Throne of Majesty on high,
With Man to sojourn, and for Man to die !--
Hark! the glad hour attesting Seraphs hail,
And songs of triumph swell the midnight gale ;
Heaven's choral host to human sight appears,
And strains angelic burst on human ears!
See! in the East his herald Star arise!
Type of that light desired by Israel's eyes:
Led by this guide, their gifts the Magi bring,
And, Heav'n-instructed, hail their infant King!
What though a manger is his earthly throne,
Yet, strong in faith, the Godhead veil'd they own ;
There, at Emmanuel's feet is incense pour'd,
And there the Incarnate God is first ador'd.
What precious gifts attend the God-born Child!
Opposing claims in Him are reconciled:
Through Him each jarring attribute shall meet
In perfect love-in harmony complete !
Mercy and Truth are knit in firm embrace;
Justice, appeas'd, now shares her throne with Grace:
On Him the iniquity of all is laid ;
By Him the price of our redemption's paid;
By Him the fetter'd Captive is unchain'd,
Deliverance won, and Paradise regain'd.
Rejoice, ye ransom'd! You your God hath freed
From pains pronounced, from penalties decreed ;
The Grave he vanquished with exulting wing,
And wrung from Death its triumph and its sting.
Pour forth your notes of praise; be glad, O Earth!
And tell the blessings of a Saviour's birth!
By every nation and by every tongue,
The joyful song of the Redeem'd be sung.
Oh, if the choral melodies above
Peal the loud anthem of forgiving Love,
To "Man forgiven" belongs a grateful strain,
Which guiltless Seraphs may attend in vain ;
No pardoning love awaits that spotless host,~~
He who is most forgiven, should love and praise the most.
December 25, 1823.
PYRAMUS and Thisbe of dashing renown,
Dwelt in houses adjoining in Babylon's town,
And flirted in circles of fashion :
They had vow'd loves eternal-squeezed hands at Almack's,
But their cursed crabbed relatives would not relax,
And swore to extinguish their passion.
Ah, but Love is like steam in an engine, inclined
Still the stronger to burst out, the more it's confined.
Parents chuckled in vain at their art in
Bribing spies who reported a parcel of flams;
So to watch them with house-maids and valet de shams,
It was all in my eye, Betty Martin !
Love-letters between them in walnut-shells pass'd,
Though, alas! wicked jaws crack'd the secret at last,
Then, O Lord, what a rumpus was brew'd up;
What carpeting, storming, hysterics, and prayers,
Tears and rummaging trunks! till the young folks up-stairs
Were in garrets respectively mew'd up.
"Twas a harsh step, no doubt, that the homes of their sires Were made bridewells for bridling their bridal desires, And a justification here isn't meant ;
But the Habeas Corpus had just been put down,
And no lawyer would budge in all Babylon's town
For a writ 'gainst their wrongous imprisonment.
Night came, and no nightingale sang o'er their heads,
But the cats squawl'd duets among chimneys and leads,
And the owls kept toowhooing and staring;
In her chamber poor Thisbe lay weeping a flood,
While Pyramus in his, damn'd the old people's blood,
In soliloquies cursing and swearing.
At last, like old Bajazet, rising in rage,
And resolved with his brains to bespatter his cage,
Headforemost he dash'd; but the gable
Was not battery-proof for a skull-piece so new
And so solidly built that it fairly went through
Bricks as old as the building of Babel.
The Lady at first, you may guess, got a shock,
That a gentleman's head at her chamber should knock,
And so unceremoniously enter,
Like a thief on a pillory hanging his phiz ;
Recognizing at length by the rush-light 'twas his,
"Lord," she cried, "what a charming adventure!
"Yet oh, Mister Pyramus, dearest of lambs,
What a blow for your skull! 't would have broken a ram's ;
Let me fetch you some eau de Cologne for 't.”—
"No, no, sweetest Thisbe, sit down tete a tete,
And a smack from your lips for the smack on my pate
Will be far more acceptable comfort."
Now to paint all the kissing and holy delights
That took place at this holey partition o' nights,
Might, perhaps, seem to some folks improper;"
So I've only to note, where the bricks had been broke,
That the damsel by day-time suspended her cloak,
And the youth hung his old flannel wrapper.
Thus woo'd they in attics--but somehow their taste
Was not Attic enough for two attics so placed;
And their hearts growing ardent as Etna,
They began to converse about parsons and rings,
Post-chaises, and such other rapturous things,-
In a word, of eloping to Gretna.
All things being managed by
With her muff and her monkey, and cash in her purse,
From an old sentimental attorney,
Little Thisbe one moon-shiny morning at three
Whipt away to the sign of the Mulberry-tree,
Half a mile out of town for their journey.
Now here let me state, (for in matters of fact
It is right to be plain, conscientious, exact,)
You must pin not a tittle of faith on
Old Ovid's narration--but mine's to be met
In a genuine antique Babylonish gazette
That was publish'd by Sanchoniathon.
But to follow my story-conceive her despair
When arrived at the inn and no Pyramus there,
Nor a light in the whole habitation;
Not a pair, nor a post-chaise to drive them from town,
Not a boy on the saddle to bob up and down-
Do you wonder she wept with vexation?
While thus in the coach-yard bewailing her pickle,
The tears of the damsel continued to trickle,
As salt as a mine-spring of Cracow,
Outsprang a chain'd mastiff—affrighted she ran,
While away went her wits, and her muff and her fan,
And away went unfortunate Jacko.
Poor pug was soon eat up, and so would the muff,
If its wadding and fur had been eatable stuff,
But 'twas torn and the spot was still bloody,
When the youth of her soul, whose unhappy delay
Had been caused by his drinking some wine by the way,
Arrived with his brains rather muddy.
All was hush'd (for the dog having sated his maw,
Laid his jowls very quietly down in the straw)
When Pyramus halloo'd out "There lies
Both the blood and the muff of my mistress so sweet!”—
She, to tell you the truth, had slipt down a by-street,
To escape from the Cyprians and Charlies.
A groom on a bulk, who had during the death
Of poor pug slept as sound as the grooms in Macbeth,
Woke at length;-but small comfort he gave, he
Had no doubt that the young lady's blood had been shed,
But that he had not injur'd a hair of her head
He was ready to make affidavy.
"But there's ruffians," says he, "that goes roaming the streets, And abusing all decent young women they meets,
More especially them as be virgins;
So the lady, I'll wager my head to that muff,
Has been ravish'd and murder'd and stript to the buff,
And her body's been sold to the surgeons."
Rash Pyramus, founding too stable belief
On a stable-boy's words, in a phrenzy of grief
From his pocket a small pistol popt out,
Which he aim'd at his noddle to finish his woes;
But his head that broke bricks was not doom'd to oppose
The lead ball-for it luckily dropt out.
So he fell, rather wondering he was'nt quite dead,
As the flash had but stunn'd him and blister'd his head!
And his fate he continu'd to rave at,
Till the inn-folks came out, and supposing his brains
Had been partially spilt, to secure the remains
They bound up his head with a cravat.
By this time his Thisbe took courage enough
To return for her lover, her monkey, and muff—
In his arms Mister Pyramus lock'd her;
But the landlord sent each to a separate bed,
And at morning, believing them wrong in the head,
Sent to Bedlam express for a doctor.
The physician, a smug little prig of a man,
Who believing two heads to be better than one
A gold head on his cane always carried,
Examined his patients with questions profound,
Rubb'd his nose, and by skill in nosology found
They were both going mad to be married.
So says he (for his heart was the kindest on earth
Towards people of fortune and fashion and birth)
"Let not Gretna your fancies enamour,
But keep here, and observe the prescriptions I've writ,
And they'll help you to marriage-bonds pleasanter knit
Than a Gretna-Green blacksmith could hammer."
To the youth 'twas enjoin'd he should foam in his speech,
And bite all who came near him excepting his leech,
Shamming hypochondriacal vapours ;
Whilst the lady was loudly to smack with her lips,
Pirouette like a top-practise opera skips,
And alarm the whole house with her capers.
Ere long, in their coaches appear'd at the inn's
Gate old spectacled noses and nutcracker chins,
In whose looks you might see civil war lower;
'Twas relations in quest of the fugitive brace,
When the short physic man, with a very long face
Made his bow in the Mulberry parlour.
"Well, Doctor, what news of the culprits?" He sigh❜d.
"Let us see them."-" No, not for the world," he replied.—
"Then for God's sake explain what their plight is."-
"Oh, a dreadful disorder, whose symptoms consist
In a rage to dance, bite, and to kiss and be kiss'd,
We, the faculty, call it Smackitis.
"Even now (and the charge in your bill is to come)
The poor youth has just bit off the head-waiter's thumb,
So inveterately fierce his disease is;
And the lady has fatal prognostics, I fear,
Of her dancing and chirruping fit being near,
Which will end in a Hyperuresis."
He had scarce spoke the words when above little Miss
Smack'd her lips,-ah! with none to return her the kiss ;
Then away she went wheeling and jumping,
And she so figurante'd them out of their wits,
That her Aunty below lay a figure in fits,
While her father and mother sat glumping.
At last cried the crusty old carle, "Afore Gad,
She deserves to be smother'd, the gipsy-she's mad!"
Quoth the doctor, "Sir, spare that infliction-
She may die in a trice, the poor dear rantipol,
Or the rest of her life be a mere dancing doll,
If you offer the least contradiction."
Oh, there's nought like a dance to make people change sides,
And a doctor may rule in a house that divides,
One did once in our own House of Commons;
So our leech having gain'd the majority's will,
Sat like Addington carrying the Medical bill,
And would bend his opinion to no man's.
The mother of Thisbe cried "Monster! and fool!
Talk of smothering my child in a manner as cool
As of smothering a rabbit in cookery!"
In a trice her poor helpmate grew meek as a lamb,
And sat twirling his thumbs-for he knew the old dam
Had a tongue that would bother a rookery.
Then said Pyramus' father, "Let's first, if you please,
Cure this smack-what d'ye call it—teetotum disease,
Ere we set to dispute with our spouses;
For to see one's own progeny bite like a bear,
Or go skipping like apes at Bartlemy fair,
Would assuredly grieve both our houses.
"Let the doctor restore the young folks if he can "—
Here the women supported him all to a man,
And the doctor, who solemn and budge meant,
To a merry conclusion gave matters to bring,
Look'd as wise as a kitten at play with a string,
While they swore to abide by his judgment.
"As to smothering, with two featherbeds it is done,
But my clinical treatment requires only one,
And the help of a conjugal tether;
So I order a ring from the jeweller's shop,
And prescribe the afflicted young couple to hop
To the temple of Hymen together."
"Ha, a biting disease," cried the churls; "and we're bit!”
Their wives, though they long'd at each other to spit,
Saw their fate, and gave in-the curmudgeons
Sent for lawyers to town, ordered dinner at six,
And when ask'd by the landlord what fish they would fix,
Groan'd, and answer'd "A couple of gudgeons."
But I wish I were Homer to tell you how all
Dumps were cured by that wedding, and banquet, and ball,
How the codgers got glorious with claret,
How the lawyers punn'd glibly-the priest with loop'd hat
Stuff'd his carcase, a pudding of orthodox fat,
While the doctor conversed like a parrot.
Thisbe's fame might have had, like her gable, a crack,
Had she single to babbling old Babylon gone back,
But a bride she defied every gazer;
So they march'd into town in the grand style of yore,
With the footmen in favours and fiddlers before,
Playing "God save King Nebuchadnezzar !"
"Midnight! yet not a nose, from Tower Hill to Piccadilly, snored!"
IN a crowded and highly cultivated state of society, like that of London, the race of exertion against time is incessant. Take a distant village, altho' a populous one, (as in Devonshire or Cornwall,) and even discord, during the hours of darkness, is found forgetting herself in rest. The last alehouse closes before the clock strikes ten, sending the very scapegraces of the hamlet, in summer, to bed by day-light; no lady would choose, after curfew hour, (even by beating her husband,) to disturb her neighbours; and, unless some tailor happens to be behindhand with a wedding pair of small clothes; or some housewife prolongs the washing-day, and gives an extra hour to her lace caps; or unless the village be a Post-stage, where the "first-turn-boy" must sleep in his spurs; or where, the mail changing horses, some one sits up to give the guard his glass of rum, no movable probably like a lighted candle is known
to such a community from eleven
o'clock on the Saturday night to
six o'clock on the Monday morning.
In London, however, the course of af-
fairs is widely different. As the broad
glare of gas drives darkness even from
our alleys, so multitudinous avocations
keep rest forever from our streets.
an arrangement the opposite to that of
Queen Penelope, it is during the night
that the work of regeneration in our
great capital goes on; it is by night
that the great reservoirs which feed
London and Westminster, repair the
vast expenditure which they make da-
ring the day. As the wants of twelve
hundred thousand persons are not min-
istered to with a wet finger, this oper-
ation of replenishment does not pro-
ceed in silence. Its action is best ob-
servable (as regards the season) towards
the end of spring; when, the town be-
ing at the fullest, the markets are more
abundantly supplied. Then, every
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