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MYSTERIES AND MORALITIES.

BY EDWARD CLODD. CONCLUSION.

HE introduction of Moralities dates from the reign of century. The personification of abstract qualities which had already found its way into the Mysteries* was a necessary element as the religious plays became less historical and more didactic in character, and the popularity of Moralities obviously quickened, because they were admirable vehicles for attacks upon or defence of current beliefs and superstitions, and could readily concern themselves with the social, political, and religious questions of the time, expressing through their allegorical character the thoughts of men's minds upon these topics.

The earliest extant English Moralities are in manuscript, and of these Mr. Payne Collier gives interesting abstracts in his "History of Dramatic Poetry."+ whilst Mr. Carew Hazlitt, in the additions which he has made to the re-issue of Dodsley's "Old Plays," has supplied us with several valuable specimens. The moral play with which that edition opens is not so early as was once held, but is especially interesting, as setting forth the advantage of the pursuit of natural knowledge. It is entitled, "A New Interlude and a Mery of the Nature of the Four Elements (ie., the earth, the water, the air, and fire), and is assigned to the early part of the sixteenth century. The Messenger," a name usually given to the prologue, is followed by Natura Naturata, who discourses, it must be admitted very tediously, to Humanity, upon the ethereal region of the heavens and the lower region of the earth, and counsels him to study these. Humanity is, however, beguiled by Sensual Appetite, but, at the last, accepts Nature's reproof. The only known copy of the play is imperfect, the middle and concluding leaves being lost.

Of a still earlier date, although printed in 1522, is the "Propre Newe Interlude of the Worlde and the Chylde," in which the several stages of human life are represented, Man appearing successively as Infans, Wanton, Lust and Lykynge, Manhode and Age. Perseverance recites to him the "Twelve Articles of the Faith and "The Commandments Ten," when Age signifies his adhesion, and is thereupon named Repentance. ‡

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In the more important "Morall-playe of Everyman, we meet with some admirable moral teaching in associa tion with expositions of the Roman Catholic religion, the defence of which appears to have been one of the objects of the play. Everyman is the representative of the human race, and is summoned by Death, already personified in the Coventry plays as the messenger of God, to appear before the Divine tribunal, and bring his "book of counte," for

"a reckoning he will need have Without any lenger respite."

In his fear, Everyman asks his friends-Fellowship, Kindred, Goods, Strength, Beauty, and others to accompany him; but they one by one forsake him when they learn who has summoned him; and in his despair he betakes himself to Good Deeds, "who is so weak that she cannot stand, verily." She upbraids him for neglect, but leads him to her sister Knowledge, who takes him to the holy man Confession. Everyman then does penance, receives the sacrament, and, with comforting words from * Vide KNOWLEDGE, p. 219, Sept. 11, 1885. + Vol. II., pp. 200-216.

Dodsley, vol. i., p. 273.

:

Good Deeds, expires. Whereupon the Doctor who has
attended him steps forward and delivers the moral :-
Ye herers, take it a worthe olde and yonge

And forsake Pryde, for he deceyves you in the ende,
And remembre Beaute, v. wyttes, Strength, and Discrecion,
They all at last do Everyman forsake,

Save his Good Dedes; there do he take;
But beware, for, and they be small,
Before God he hathe no helpe at all.*

An Act was passed in the reign of Henry VIII., forbidding any person to "play in interludes, sing or rhyme

any matter contrary to the doctrine of the Church of Rome." This was repealed under Edward VI., and accordingly among the Moral Plays of his time we have, in "Lusty Juventus," a defence of the Bible against tradition and the superstitions of the Romish Church. The "parsonages that speake" are "Messenger, Lusty Juventus, Good Counsaill, Knowledge, Sathan the devyll, his son Hypocrisie, Felowship, Abhominable Lyvying, and God's Mercifull Promises." Lusty Juventus represents the "frailtie of youth," of "nature prone to vyce,' and is led astray by a gay woman, Abhominable Lyvyng, but finally reclaimed by good Counsaill. The edifying speeches of Good Counsaill and Knowledge are fortified with Bible references by no means contributory to the rhythm, as thus:

The prophet David saith, that the man is blessed
Which doth exercise himsel in the law of the Lord,
And doth not follow the way of the wicked;
As the first psalm doth plainly record;

The fourscore and thirteenth psalm thereunto doth accord.

My meaning is, as Christ saith in the sixth chapter of Matthew, To do to him as you would be done to.

I will show you what Saint Paul doth declare

In his Epistle to the Hebrews and the tenth chapter.+

Satan is wittily represented as lamenting the downfall of the old religion: "ful well," he says, I know the cause,

That my estimacion doth thus decay;
The olde people would beleve stil in my lawes,
But the yonger sort leade them a contrary way.
They wyll not beleve, they playnly say,

In old traditions and made by men,

But they wyll lyve as the Scripture teacheth them. Hypocrisie recites a long list of the mummeries by which he had deceived men "since the world began":

Holy cardinals, holy popes,
Holy vestments, holy copes,
Holy pardons, holy beads,
Holy saints, holy images,
With holy, holy blood.
Holy stocks, holy stones,
Holy clouts, holy bones,
Holy wax, holy lead,
Holy water, holy bread,
Holy brooches, holy rings,

Holy kneeling, holy censings,

And a hundred trim-trams mo.‡

But such contempt was not confined to the Protestants. In John Heywood's "Enterlude of the Four P's," i.e., a Palmer, a Pardoner, a 'Poticary, and a Pedlar, the author, although a staunch Catholic, flings some coarse satire against the relic-mongers. The play itself is amusing as hinging on a dispute between the four characters as to who could tell the biggest lie. The credit falls to the Palmer, who remarks incidentally that he never saw a woman out of patience, whereupon the others, taken off their guard, declare it to be the greatest lie they ever heard. It is through the Pardoner that Heywood directs *Collier, II., 228.

† Dodsley, Vol. I., pp, 55, 59. Dodsley, Vol. II., pp. 65-6.

his attack on the religious frauds of the mendicant friars. He represents him as exhibiting wine drunk at the wedding of Adam and Eve; "a box full of humble bees that stung Eve as she sat on her knees tasting the fruit to her forbidden;" a slipper of one of the Seven Sleepers; the jaw-bone of All Saints; a buttock-bone of the Holy Ghost; and "the great toe of the Trinity," on which the 'Poticary remarks :—

I pray you turn that relic about:
Either the Trinity had the gout,

Or else, because it is three toes in one,
God made it as much as three toes alone.*

Mr. Herbert Spencer, in his Study of Sociology, refers to an illuminated missal in the possession of Mr. Huth, in which the Trinity is represented by three persons standing in one pair of boots. Heywood's satire is justified by the disclosures made in his time in the report of the Commissioners appointed by Thomas Cromwell to inquire into the state of the monasteries,† and by the currency of legends such as that gravely related of St. Clara de Monte Falconis ::

That after her death there was found in her gall a plain testimony of the Holy Trinity, consisting of three balls of equal figure, colour, and size, and of equal weight, one weighing the weight of two and also of three, yet all three weighing no more than one!

But we pass beyond the assigned limits of our subject in referring to the Interludes, so called because they were played in the intervals of banquets and other festivities, since these fill the gap between the Moral-play and the regular drama. The abstract characters of the former were slowly displaced by concrete figures from history, the portrayal of whose actions came so much nearer men's "business and bosoms" in those stirring times than any life of prophet, warrior, or king of a remote past and unsubstantial age, however crowded with supernatural detail. In addition to this, the institution fell into disrepute by reason of the indecency and buffoonery which were no longer in harmony with the improving taste of the people. So the religious drama passed from the hands of the guilds to those of the strolling player in town and country fairs, and the bans of the heralds to the "walk up, walk up" of the puppet showman. In the Spectator of March 16, 1711, Steele intimates that Powell the showman exhibited religious subjects with his puppets under the little piazza in Covent Garden, and talks of "his next opera of Susannah or Innocence betrayed, which will be exhibited next week with a pair of new Elders," while the following droll specimen from Strutt's Sports and Pastimes also evidences to the performance of Mysteries in this country as late as the eighteenth century:

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* "Dodsley," Vol. I., p. 362.

+ Langton sends to Cromwell, among other reliques, Our Ladies smock, parte of God's supper, a fragment of stone from the manger at Bethlehem, while Dr. London sends from the abbey of Reading "the principal relique of idolytrie within this realm-an angel with one wing that brought to Caversham the spearhede that percyd our Saviour his syde upon the Crosse." In the inventory of reliques in the abbot's house, we find "two peces of the Holye Cross, Saynt James his hand, a bone of Mary Magdalene, a chow-bone of Saint Ethelwolde." Vid. Suppression of the Monasteries. Camden Society, 1843, pp. 58, 227.

6. Abraham offering his son Isaac.

7. Three wise men of the East guided by a star, who worship him.

8. Joseph and Mary flew away by night upon an ass.

9. King Herod's cruelty; his men's spears laden with children. 10. Rich Dives invites his friends, and orders his porter to keep the beggars from his gate.

11. Poor Lazarus comes a begging at rich Dives” gate, and the dogs lick his sores.

12. The good angel and death contend for Lazarus's life.

13. Rich Dives is taken sick and dieth. He is buried in great solemnity.

14. Rich Dives in hell, and Lazarus in Abraham's bosom, seen in a most glorious object, all in machines descending in a throne, guarded with multitudes of angels, with the breaking of the clouds, discovering the palace of the sun, in double and treble prospects, to the admiration of all spectators. Likewise several rich and large figures, with dances, jiggs, sarabrands, anticks, and country dances between every act: compleated with the merry humours of Sir John Spendall and Punchanello, with several other things never yet exposed. Perform'd by Mat Heatly. Vivat Regina."

Enough, however, has been said and cited to show that the Miracle Play has an interest not so much for the antiquarian as for the student of culture. Our knowledge of the manifold causes which contributed to the moral development of England during the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries would be very imperfect if we omitted the influence of this institution on a people among whom only portions of the Bible began to be circulated as late as the sixteenth century. It at least powerfully affected human conduct in supplying men with conceptions, rude and false though we now know them to have been, of a divine government of the world and a tribunal at which they would at the last be judged, but at the same time it did quite otherwise than contribute to the permanence of any one form of theology. view of the political and personal causes which in England precipitated the Reformation, it is not easy to apportion to the religious plays of that period their share in the dethronement of sacerdotalism, and in the substitution of the authority of the Bible for that of the Church, which proved to be but an exchange of fetters; enough that they were on the liberal side, even when it seemed otherwise. For as the permanent in thought cannot be literalised and localised, the representation of the Deity in a linen coat and gloves could only quicken the advance of conceptions which refuse to surround Him with the limitations of Personality.

LIVE STOCK IN EUROPE.+

In

HE United States Consul in Copenhagen, writing on the subject of the live stock in Europe, says that the number of horned cattle throughout Europe is estimated at about 92,000,000, of horses 36,000,000, of sheep Of the 200,000,000, and of swine about 46,000,000. European States, the Scandinavian countries and Servia stand in a prominently favourable position as regards the relative amount of their live stock to the inhabitants, Denmark ranking first on the list with 755 head of horned cattle per 1,000 inhabitants, next Servia with 609, then Norway with 562, and, lastly, Sweden with 483. France may be taken as representing the European average, whilst below the average come Great Britain, Spain, Belgium, Greece, Portugal, and Italy. Of sheep, Servia has relatively the largest number, namely, 2,200 head for 1,000 inhabitants, and Greece with 1,496. Spain, Roumania, Great Britain, and Norway rank as above the European average, Denmark above the average with 777 head, and all the other countries below the average, the

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lowest in rank being Holland, Switzerland, and Belgium, with 121 head. Of swine, Servia has relatively also the largest number, namely, 1,062 head, whilst Spain, which follows next, has only 272, then Denmark with 263; Portugal, Austria, Roumania, and Germany being all above the average, France about the average, and the remaining countries below, the lowest in rank being Sweden, Holland, Italy, and Norway, with only 56 head. In an examination of the total numbers of live stock in the different countries, it will be found that Russia has the decided superiority, taking all classes of animals together. This country, including Poland and Finland, in the year 1876, possessed 25,000,000 head of horned cattle, 45,000,000 sheep, 10,000,000 swine, and 17,000,000 horses. The increase during the last twenty years has been greatest in sheep-about 20 per cent.; whereas the increase of horned cattle and swine has only been about 4 per cent.; and horses have remained stationary. Next to Russia, Germany has the largest number of horned cattle about 15,000,000, of sheep 25,000,000, of swine 7,000,000, and of horses 3,000,000. In Prussia there has been, of late years, a considerable increase in all classes of animals; in Saxony and Baden it has been stationary; while in Bavaria, Wurtemberg, Hesse, and Oldenburg there has been a falling off. Austria, with Hungary, ranks third on the list, so far as horned cattle and swine are concerned, respectively with 12,000,000 and 7,000,000; in the second rank as regards horses, namely, 3,000,000, but only in the sixth rank as regards sheep, with 20,000,000. After Austria, France has the next largest number of horned cattle, about 11,000,000 head, while it only occupies the fourth place for sheep and swine, namely, 24,000,000 and 5,000,000, and 2,000,000 horses. From 1850 to 1872 there was a considerable falling off in horned cattle in France, but in later years there has been a steady imGreat Britain follows next in regard to provement. horned cattle, namely, with 9,000,000 head; but, in respect to sheep, stands second on the list with 32,000,000; she takes the fourth rank in respect to horses, viz., with 2,750,000, but for swine only the sixth rank, with 4,000,000. Live stock in Great Britain has fallen off very considerably of late years; for example, from 1874 to 1880 there was a decrease of 500,000 head of cattle, 4,000,000 sheep, and 750,000 swine. Italy ranks last with respect to horned cattle, with 3,500,000 head, 1,000,000 horses, 9,000,000 sheep, and 3,750,000 swine. Of late years there has been a falling-off in the number of horned cattle, but sheep show an increase. In Holland the absolute number of live stock may be given as 1,500,000 head of cattle, 1,000,000 sheep, 500,000 swine, and 300,000 horses. The cattle interest in this country is of considerably more importance than the culture of cereals, about 40 per cent. of the land area being devoted to meadow and grass land. Denmark, in the cattle census of 1881, was stated to possess about 347,500 horses, 1,470,000 head of horned cattle, 1,548,600 sheep and lambs, and 527,000 swine. These figures, as compared with the previous census of 1876, show a very considerable increase in horned cattle and swine, while there is a diminution in the number of horses to the extent of 5,000, and in sheep of 170,000. In Norway, where the cattle interest is of more importance than cereal culture, the number of horned cattle is given at about 1,000,000 head, sheep at about 1,700,000, but of swine not more than about 100,000. Lastly, Sweden appears with 2,000,000 head of horned cattle, 1,500,000 sheep, 500,000 horses, and 450,000 swine. Taking the extra European countries,

the United States comes first with its enormous and steadily-increasing amount of live stock, which, notwithstanding the large annual increase of population from natural causes as well as from the great tide of emigration annually pouring into the country, has been fully able to keep pace with its relative position to the population. According to the latest returns, the number of horned cattle in 1882 amounted to 41,000,000; of sheep and lambs, 49,000,000; horses, 11,000,000; and swine, 43,000,000. From Canada there are no later census returns than those of 1871, when the numbers given were 2,700,000 head of horned cattle, about 3,000,000 sheep, and 1,500,000 swine. South America has relatively a larger number of animals even than the United States, especially the La Plata States are noted for their enormous hordes. Statistics place the number of horned cattle at 19,500,000 head, with 70,000,000 sheep, and about 500,000 swine. In the Pampas the horned cattle are estimated at 30,000,000. In Algeria the number of live stock in 1879 was stated as 1,200,000 head of horned cattle, and about 9,000,000 sheep. As regards Australia, the stock of animals in these colonies has received a very great increase during the last ten years. In the census of 1878, horned cattle are stated as 7,400,000, as compared with 4,700,000 in 1876; sheep, 61,000,000, against 51,000,000; and swine, 815,000, against 695,000. The proportion of live stock to every 1,000 inhabitants is very large, being as much as 2,800 head for horned cattle, 23,400 for sheep, and 310 for swine.

T

FIRST STAR LESSONS.

BY RICHARD A. PROCTOR.

constellations included in the twenty-four maps of this series are numbered throughout as follows (the names being omitted on the maps, to clear these as far as possible from all that might render the stargrouping less distinct) :—

1. Ursa Minor, the Little Bear (a, the Pole Star). 2. Draco, the Dragon (a, Thuban)

3. Cepheus, King Cepheus. 4. Cassiopeia, the Lady in the Chair.

5. Perseus, the Champion (ẞ, Algol, famous variable). 6. Auriga, the Charioteer (a, Capella)

7. Ursa Major, the Greater Bear (a, ẞ, the Pointers).

8. Canes Venatici, the Hunting Dogs (a, Cor Caroli). 9. Coma Berenices, Queen Berenice's Hair.

10. Boötes, the Herdsman (a, Arcturus).

11. Corona Borealis, the Northern Crown.

12. Serpens, the Serpent.
13. Hercules, the Kneeler.
14. Lyra, the Lyre (a, Vega).
15. Cygnus, the Swan

Arided; B, Albires).

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16. Pegasus, the Winged Horse. 17. Andromeda, the Chained Lady.

18. Triangula, the Triangles. 19. Aries, the Ram.

20. Taurus, the Bull (a, Aldeburan; n, Alcyone, chief Pleiad).

21. Gemini, the Twins (a, Castor; B, Pollux).

22. Cancer,

the Crab (the cluster is the Beehive). 23. Leo, the Lion (a, Regulus). 24. Virgo, the Virgin (a, Spica). 25. Libra, the Scales.

26. Ophiuchus, the Serpent

Holder.

27. Aquila, the Eagle (a, Altair). 28. Delphinus, the Dolphin. 29. Aquarius, the Water Carrier. 30. Pisces, the Fishes. 31. Cetus, the Sea Monster (o, Mira, remarkable riable).

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32. Eridanus, the River. 33. Orion, the Giant Hunter (a, Betelgeur; ß, Rigel). 34. Canis Minor, the Lesser Dog (a, Procyon).

35. Hydra, the Sea Serpent (a, Alphard).

36. Crater, the Cup (a, Alkes). 37. Corvus, the Crow.

38. Scorpio, the Scorpion (a, Antares).

39. Sagittarius, the Archer. 40. Capricornus, the Sea Goat. 41. Piscis Australis, the Sou thern Fish (a, Fomalhaut). 42. Lepus, the Hare. 43. Columba, the Dove. 44. Canis Major, the Greater Dog (a, Sirius). 45. Argo, the Ship.

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EARTHQUAKES.

BY RICHARD A. PROCTOR.

At 9 o'clock.........November 3.
At 9 o'clock.. ..November 7.
At 8 o'clock.. ........November 10.

T is related in the Timæus of Plato that the ancient

widely-extended catastrophes, by which the gods checked the evil propensities of men, and cleansed the earth from guilt. Conflagrations, deluges and earthquakes were the instruments of the wrath of the offended gods. After each catastrophe mankind were innocent and happy, but from this state af virtue they gradually fell away, until

At 8 o'clock.........November 14. At 8 o'clock.........November 18. At 8 o'clock......... .November 22.

their accumulated offences called for new judgments. Then the gods took counsel together, and unable to bear with the multiplied iniquities of the human race, swept them from the earth in some great cataclysm, or sent a devouring flame to consume them, or shook the solid earth until hills and mountains fell upon and crushed the inhabitants of the whole world.

One can understand how the confused records of great catastrophes, in which all, or nearly all, the inhabitants of wide districts were destroyed, led in the course of time to the formation of such views as Plato has described. And, indeed, it is not in one nation alone that

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of Menu the Hindoos are taught that at the end of each of those cycles of ages which are termed the "days of Brahma," all forms of life are destroyed from the earth by a great conflagration, followed by a deluge which inundates heaven itself. The mythical legends of the Chinese refer to similar views, which appear also in the Babylonian and Persian cosmogonies. The Chaldeans taught that when the planets are all conjoined in Capricorn the earth will be overwhelmed by a flood, and that when a conjunction of this sort takes place in Cancer the earth will be destroyed by fire.

In the present age when the network of telegraphy brings all parts of the earth into close intercommunication, we are not likely to trace, even in the most widespread disasters, the approaching destruction of our globe. The same day which brings the intelligence of some desolating catastrophe brings evidence also that the devastation is but local. We are seldom informed of simultaneous, or nearly simultaneous, events happening in widely-separated regions of the earth's surface. Accordingly, we are seldom led to dread the occurrence of any widely-devastating series of catastrophes.

We have heard a great deal lately of certain speculations-recently ventilated by an American philosopherwhich threaten the earth with complete annihilation. According to these views there is one great danger to which we are at all times liable-the risk, namely, that some large volcanic vent should be formed beneath the bosom of ocean. Through this vent the sea would rush into the interior of the earth, and being forthwith converted into steam by the intense subterranean heat, would rend the massive shell on which we live into a thousand fragments.

Whether it is possible or not that such an event as this should take place, I shall not here stay to inquire. Let it suffice that the risk-if there be any—is no greater now than it has been any time during thousands of past years.

But certainly, if there is any source from which the inhabitants of the earth may reasonably dread the occurrences of widely devastating catastrophes, it is from earthquakes. It is related that for full six months after the great earthquake of Lisbon, Dr. Johnson refused to believe in the occurrence of so terrible a catastrophe. "He spoke half jestingly," Macaulay thought-it is not easy to see on what grounds. To us it seems far more probable that Johnson heard with natural wonder and awe of the destructive effects of this fearful convulsion; and that for awhile he could scarcely believe that the extent of the disaster had not been exaggerated. It would be well if, indeed, the powers of earthquakes were less tremendous than they have been repeatedly shown to be. "There is," says Humboldt,

"no other outward manifestation of force known to usthe murderous inventions of our own race includedthrough which, in the brief period of a few seconds or minutes, a larger number of human beings have been destroyed than by earthquakes." Lightning and storm, war and plague, are but weak and inefficient agents of destruction in comparison with the earth's internal forces.

And as earthquakes surpass all other phenomena as agents of sudden destruction, so the impression which they produce on those who for the first time experience their effects is peculiarly and indescribably awful. Men of reputed courage speak of a feeling of "intolerable dread" produced by the shocks of an earthquake, "even when unaccompanied by subterannean noises." The impression is not that of simple fear but a feeling of

absolute pain. The reason seems for awhile to have lost the power of separating real from imaginary causes of terror. The lower animals, also, are thrown into a state of terror and distress. "Swine and dogs," says Humboldt, "are particularly affected by the phenomenon of earthquakes." And he adds that "the very crocodiles of the Orinoco, otherwise as dumb as our little lizards, leave the shaken bed of the stream and run bellowing into the woods."

Humboldts explanation of the peculiar sensations of alarm and awe produced by an earthquake upon those who for the first time experience the effects of the phenomenon is in all probability the correct one. "The impression here is not," he says, "the consequence of the recollection of destructive catastrophes presented to our imagination by narratives of historical events; what seizes us so wonderfully is the disabuse of that innate faith in the fixity of the solid and sure-set foundations of the earth. From early childhood we are habituated to the contrast between the mobile element water and the immobility of the soil on which we stand. All the evidences of our senses have confirmed this belief. But when suddenly the ground begins to rock beneath us, the feeling of an unknown mysterious power in nature coming into operation and shaking the solid globe arises in the mind. The illusion of the whole of our earlier life is annihilated in an instant."

Use habituates the mind to the shocks of earthquake. Humboldt found himself able after awhile to give a close and philosophic scrutiny to the circumstances attending the phenomenon which had at first impressed him so startlingly. And he tells us that the inhabitants of Peru think scarcely more of a moderate shock of earthquake than is thought of a hail-storm in the temperate zone.

Yet the annals of earthquakes are sufficient to give rise to a feeling of dread, founded, not merely on the novelty of the event, but on a knowledge of the powers of the earth's internal heavings. The narratives of some of the great earthquakes afford fearful evidence on this point.

In the first shock of the great earthquake of Lisbon (November, 1755) the city was shaken to its foundations. The houses were swung to and fro so violently that the upper stories fell at once, causing a terrible loss of life. Thousands rushed to the great square in front of St. Paul's Church, to escape the reach of the tottering ruins. It was the festival of All Saints, and all the churches had been crowded with worshippers. But when the terrified inhabitants reached the square, they found that the great church of St. Paul's was already in ruins, and the immense multitude which had thronged its sacred precincts were involved in its destruction. Such of the congregations of the different churches as had escaped rushed to the banks of the Tagus for safety. There were to be seen priests in their sacerdotal vestments, and an immense crowd of people of all ranks and ages, praying to Heaven for mercy. As they prayed there came the second shock, scarcely less terrible than the first. church on the top of St. Catherine's Hill was rocked to and fro till it fell, crushing in its fall a great multitude which had sought that height for safety.

The

But a far more terrible catastrophe was at hand. As the banks of the river sounded with the Miserere of the terrified supplicants who had crowded thither for safety, there was seen to pass over the wide expanse of the stream (here four miles broad) a strange heaving swell, though no wind stirred the air. The waters seemed to be drawn away to meet a vast wave which was now first

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