The accidental discovery by children of their real parents, giving rise to a burst of instinctive filial affection, has been a fruitful subject with the writers of imagination in all ages and countries. One of the most striking of these instances is that of young Norval discovering his mother, in the play of Douglas; a distinguished drama composed by a Scotch clergyman, for which he was expelled the kirk by the bigotry of his order.

I am thy mother, and the wife of Douglas.

N. Oh heaven and earth! how wondrous is my fate!
Art thou my mother? ever let me kneel!

In real life one of the most tragical of French anecdotes is that regarding the son of the celebrated Ninon de L' Enclos, who had been brought up in ignorance of his mother, and, not knowing his relationship, made love to her. On her saying to him, "I must take the bandage from your eyes; learn that you are my son, and shudder at the criminal passion which inflames you"-he precipitately rushed from her presence without saying a word, and killed himself with his sword in an adjoining wood. This remarkable woman was so fasci nating that she captivated the Abbé Godeyn, then twentynine years of age, when she was eighty. The Abbé de Chanlieu said of her, that love had entrenched himself even in the wrinkles of her forehead.

In the Grecian comedies, which are the foundation of most of the plays of Plautus and Terence, the meeting of lost children with their parents is a very common incident. In the small states of Greece, especially those bordering on the coast, and from which one political party was constantly expelling another, and during the prevalence of slavery and many immoral prac

tices, the loss of a child, and its accidentally falling in with its parent after a lapse of years, and being recognized by a mark, (as Cymbeline's son,) or some ornament, would probably have appeared a very natural incident in a drama. On this subject, the following passage, extracted from Plautus's prologue to his play of the Carthaginians, may be thought curious; the play is remarkable for preserving a few words which were part of the ancient Carthaginian language. The prologue has been literally translated by Mr. Thornton. It presents a picture of Roman manners, and affords a specimen of Plautus's coarse wit, which is strongly contrasted with the refined elegance of Terence, who was assisted by Scipio and Lælius, as he himself admits, but who, according to the only verses extant by Julius Cæsar, wanted the vis comica of Plautus.

The manager would have you

all to hear,

And in your places with good humour sit;
Whether or full, or fasting ye are come.
Those who have din'd I look upon as wisest :
Such as have not, may dine upon the play.
Let the slaves stand, that freemen may sit down,
Or
pay for seats, if they have wherewithal.
Or else march home, and 'scape a double evil;
Here to be beat with rods, at home with thongs,

If things be not in order, when their masters

Come back again. Let nurses keep their bantlings

At home, nor hither think of bringing them,

Lest they should die with thirst; their brats with hunger;

Or, when they want the teat, should baa like kids

For milk. Let matrons silent see the piece,

And smile in silence too; nor with their voices,

Loud as they 're shrill, come to his place to babble,
Home is the place to hold their prittle-prattle;
Nor teaze their husbands here, and at home too.
Now to the story of the comedy-

That you may be as wise as I myself.

Its scite, its bounds, abutments I'll lay down;
For
you must know that I am made surveyor-
But first of all, if you so please I'll give you
The name of this our piece-If you don't please,
I'll tell it ne'ertheless-for I've authority
From those who manage-This same play in Greek
Is call'd The Carthaginian; but, in Latin,

'Tis term'd by Plautus, The Pulse-eating Uncle.
You have the name; and now shall know the rest.
There were two brothers, Carthaginians both,
Both opulent, and of a noble family:

One yet is living, but the other's dead.
And this with greater confidence I say,

Because the embalmer, who embalm'd him, told me.
The brother who is dead, had but one son,
This only son, when seven years old, was stolen
From Carthage, and secreted from his father-
Six years indeed before the old man's death-
He, seeing he had lost his only son,

Fell sick with grief, making his brother heir;
Then, without taking leave, set out for Acheron.
The kidnapper brought off the child to Calydon;
Here sold him to a rich old man desirous
Of having children, but averse to marriage.
This old man bought him, without knowing him
To be the son of his old host at Carthage;
Adopted him, and made him when he died

His heir-The young man lives there in that house.
To Carthage shall I now return again—
Have you, good folks, any commands at Carthage?
If so, pay down the ready, or you trifle-
But if you pay it, you will trifle more—
This young man's uncle, old, and living still
At Carthage, had two daughters-five years old
Was one, the other four: when with their nurse
Together they were lost and from Megara,
By stealth, convey'd away to Anactorium.
There the kidnapper sold for ready money
Both nurse and children, to a man, (if panders
Are men) that most accursed upon earth—

Yourselves

farther may

guess

what kind of man

He is, whose name is Lycus-From that town,
From Anactorium, where he liv'd before,
He, on account of gain, remov'd but lately
Hither to Chalydon-In that house he lives.
Near that young man here, ignorant who she is,
And little thinking she's his own relation.
The Carthaginian, having lost his daughters
Seeks them by sea and land; and at each town
Gives gold, prolongs the night in his enquiries,
Whence, of what family, of what estate,
Servile, or free; taken in war, or stolen?

So wisely of his daughters he pursues

The search; so subtlely too. All languages

He knows; but hides his knowledge; he's so true

A Carthaginian. 'Twas but yester eve,

In short, he landed at this port. The father

Of these two girls is uncle to the youth, (going,)

Hold! I'd almost forgot to tell the rest.

He who adopted this young man, was guest,
And well received by the Carthaginian,

Who will this day be here, and find his daughters,
With this his brother's son, as I've been told.
Well, I go in and dress, and you with carefulness
Remember this, he who to-day arrives here,
Will find his daughters, and his brother's son.
Then fare ye well-attend, I'll go, e'er long
To appear another man.

An act of filial piety was performed by Clodia, one of the six Vestal Virgins of Rome. Her father had got into his tiiumphal car; but, the Tribunes of the people, who were armed by the Roman Constitution with a veto upon triumphs, as well as most other acts of state, had stopped the horses, and were going to make him descend. Clodia hearing of this, rushed to the spot, jumped into the car, and ordered the charioteer to drive on; and so her father had his triumph. It should be observed that the Vestal Virgins were

looked upon with such superstitious reverence, that if they met a prisoner by accident, they had a right to order his immediate release: and the highest officers, as the Consuls and Prætors, lowered their fasces to them, and stept aside to let them pass. This anecdote of Clodia is ingeniously introduced by Cicero in his defence of Cœlius, which Mr. Fox thought the best of his orations-Cœlius was accused by another Clodia, a celebrated woman of the same family, but who was no Vestal, of an attempt to poison her. This Clodia is supposed to have been the Lesbia whose dead sparrow has been immortalized by Catullus. Her brother Clodius (of Bona Dea notoriety) defaced the "Corinthian capital" reared by his ancestors in a still more shameless manner, by getting adopted into a Plebeian family, in order to qualify himself to be elected a Tribune of the people.

Cicero, in the name of an old ancestor of Clodia, whom he supposes to be upbraiding her, charges her with filial impiety, by the depravity of her conduct, towards the manes of her virtuous ancestors. But rhetorical adversaries are so ingenious, that a person is not safe from their shafts, though his ancestors are as bad as Clodia's were excellent. This treatment the Duke of Grafton experienced from Junius. "The character of the reputed ancestors of some men, has made it possible for their descendants to be vicious in the extreme, without being degenerate. Those of your Grace, for instance, left no distressing examples of virtue, even to their legitimate posterity; and you may look back with pleasure to an illustrious pedigree, in which heraldry has not left a single good quality upon record to insult or upbraid you. You have better proofs of your descent, my Lord, than the register of a marriage, or any troublesome inheritance of reputation.