page, BURLINGTON HOUSE, PICCADILLY. THE family mansion, on the annexed represents the first good house that was built in Piccadilly, the noble founder of which, upon being asked "why he built his house in Piccadilly, so far out of town?" replied, "Because I was determined to have no build ing beyond me." And certainly he has executed this design as firmly as bricks and mortar could make it. It is on the north side, eastward of Bond-street; and not many poles from it formerly stood Clarendon House, the front gate of which was precisely on the site of the present Albemarle-street.* Before we describe the Burlington mansion, it may be interesting to note a few particulars of the early state of the district in which it is situate. Piccadilly is so called from Piccadilly House,† which stood on the site of Sackville-street, and was a sort of repository for piccadillas, or ruffs, when there were no other houses here. Ruffs were also called turn-overs and capes. Pennant says the street was completed as far as the present Berkeleystreet, in the year 1642. The neighbourhood increased very rapidly after the Revolution, as appears from the following. Berkeley, or Devonshire House was among the early mansions erected here. The first structure, by Inigo Jones, was remarkable for the number of chimneys. It was destroyed by fire in 1733; and a few days after, a statue of Britannia, in white marble, which ornamented the front of the house, fell, and was dashed to pieces. The present Devonshire House is very inferior to the original mansion. "Sir Thomas Clarges held a large piece of ground situated on the road leading from Piccadilly to Hyde Park Corner, previous to 1700, which he conveyed to Thomas Neale, Esq. under the supposition that he intended to expend 10,000%. in buildings to be erected on it. The terms were 1007. per annum, with a power of re-entry in case of twenty-one days' arrears, and 5s. per diem, nomine piense, till the money was paid. Neale held the ground ten years waste, and then died insolvent, For an Engraving of Clarendon House, see Mirror, vol. xiii. p. 289. + Lord Clarendon thus mentions a house of the name of Piccadilly. "Mr. Hyde, (speaking of himself,) going to a house called Piccadilly, which was a fair house for entertainment and gaming, with handsome gravel walk and shade, and an upper and lower bowling-green, whither many of the nobility and gentry of the best quality resorted for exercise and recreation." The Rev. Mr. Nightingale, in his "London and Middlesex," says, "this seems to have been the same house with that mentioned by Garrard, in his letter to the Earl of Strafford, dated June, 1635; in which he says, that, "since Spring Gardens was put down, we have, by a servant of the Lord Chamberlain, a new Spring Gardens erected in the fields beyond the Meuse; where is built a fair house, and two bowling-greens, made to entertain gamesters and bowlers, at an excessive rate, for I believe it hath cost him above £4000. A dear undertaking for a gentleman barber," &c.-(From our obliging Correspondent, P. T. W.) indebted 8007. for rent to Sir Walter Clages, son and heir of Sir Thomas, who applied to parliament to release his property from Neale's creditors. This ground is pointed out by Clarges-street, named from the above family." "It has been said that a brewer bought part of a field near Piccadilly for 30%, which he used as a place to deposit his butts and lumber; and that the same ground was sold, in 1764, for 2,500l." Great part of Piccadilly remained without a pavement till 1721, when the inhabitants obtained permission to erect the turnpike, which stood within these few years opposite Hyde Park gate. In the hollow of Piccadilly, the confluence of water after heavy rains was formerly very great; and the overflow was so serious, December 1726, that it had nearly overturned the coach of the Ambassador from Morocco; "but that of the Baron Hartoff, less fortunate, fell on its side, and his daughter, with others in the carriage, narrowly escaped with their lives, by being conveyed lying on a short ladder on men's shoulders to the high ground."§ Proceeding towards Hyde Park Corner, a large tract of ground was leased, in 1757, to the Hon. George Hamilton, whence the name of Hamilton Place; on this ground stood a row of cottages, and beyond them, in 1742, nearly on the site of Apsley House, (built in 1772,) was a road-side inn, the Hercules' Pillars, where Squire Western, (in Tom Jones,) put up on his arrival in town in quest of his daughter. This line, from Devonshire House, was also, before 1740, remarkable for a succession of shops of statuaries, "where," says Malcolm, "numberless wretched figures were manufactured in lead for gardens.” The site of Burlington House was, we believe, originally occupied by a farm-house. The mansion was built by the second Earl of Burlington, father of Richard, the Earl of Burlington, whom Mr. Allan Cunningham has very properly ranked among the eminent British architects.|| The engraving represents the original mansion, with the gardens laid out in the quaint, formal taste of the seventeenth century. Beyond them is seen the country, now intersected by Regent-street and Portland-place. The adjoining gardens are now occupied by the Albany in suites of chambers; and the mansion in front was a short time possessed by the late Duke of York, from whom it has received its name. Subsequently to the date of the print, T Burlington House was profusely embellished by Lord Burlington, the celebrated architect. He raised a new stone front to the mansion, and connected the centre with the wings by a very graceful and classic colonnade" of the Doric order: "Lord Burlington," says Malcolm's Londinum Redivivum, vol. iv. p. 328. Mr. Cunningham, when the public praised it, "had no objection to claim it for his own; but, in truth, the design is almost all Palladio's, and was borrowed from the palace of Count Veiricati, at Vicenza.”* Pennant rates the mansion lowly: "The interior," he observes,“ built on the models of Palladio, and adapted more to the climate of Lombardy, and to the banks of the Adige, or the Brenta, than to the Thames, is gloomy and destitute of gaiety and cheerfulness."+ Lord Burlington will be remembered as the munificent patron of Kent, the ingenious architect and improver of landscape gardening, to whom the Earl was willing to assign the merit of the plan of the new front and colonnade. Horace Walpole, also the friend and admirer of Kent, was with him in Italy at the time of these embellishments being completed: "immediately on the return of the latter he was invited," says Cunningham, "to a ball by the Earl, and as he passed under the gate by night he could not perceive the consummate beauty of the design." "As we have few examples," says Horace," of architecture more antique and imposing than the colonnade, I cannot help mentioning the effect it had upon myself. I had not only never seen it, but had never heard of it. At daybreak, looking out of the window to see the sun rise, I was surprised with the vision of the colonnade that fronted me. It seemed one of those edifices in fairy tales that are raised by genii in a night time." Kent had apartments in Burlington House, and here he died, aged 65, in 1748. Upon the death of Lord Burlington, in 1753, the mansion fell to the Devonshire family by the marriage of his only daughter, the then Duke. The express condition of the bequest was that the property should not be demolished; though Mr. Cunningham tells us that "this splendid mansion, the chief ornament of Piccadilly, was on the point of being sacrificed to the demon of street-building, then raging in its neighbourhood, when Lord George Cavendish, (the present Earl of Burlington,) had the generosity to purchase, and the taste to reUnfortustore it in its original beauty." nately, the mansion is at present fronted by a lofty wall, though the central gateway is of highly embellished character: this screening is, nevertheless to be regretted, the mansion having been recently described by a competent judge, as "almost the only town residence which is really fit for a British nobleman."§ In 1809, the Duke of Portland died at Burlington House, only a few days after he had resigned his seat in the cabinet. Ibid. + London. The title of Burlington then became extinct, but it has been recently revived. The writer of a paper on the Architecture of the Metropolis, read before the Literary and Philosophical Society of Liverpool, in 1826. THE ORPHAN. ACROSS the moor where sighing night-winds blew, WHEN friendship or love When truth, in a glance should appear, With a dimple or smile, But the test of affection's a tear. But the hypocrite's wile, Whilst the soul-telling eye To us mortals below, Where this virtue is felt, The man doom'd to sail For a fanciful wreath, And bathes ev'ry wound with a tear. When embracing the maid, Sweet scene of my youth, Seat of friendship and truth, GRAY. Where love chas'd each fast-fleeting year; For a last look I turn'd, But thy spire was scarce seen through a tear, Though my vows I can pour, To my Mary no more, My Mary, to love once so dear; She rewarded those vows with a tear. By another possest, Her name still my heart must revere; What I once thought was mine, Ye friends of my heart, May we meet, as we part, with a tear. When my soul wings her flight Shall emblazon my name expected to take, so very prominent a part in The Fairy Court.* Oberon, the Emperor.-Mab,† the Empress. Perriwiggin — Puck‡ -Tomalin - Perriwinckle- Tit-Nit. Mother of the Maids :-Nymphidia. WITH the dawn of refinement, and progress of education, many innocent creeds and sweet associations have passed away; and we are of those who deeply lament that this change, not for the better, has come over the spirit of nations. Amongst others, and chiefly from Great Britain, that domestic and pleasant belief has departed which gave "a local habitation and a name," to beings of a nature Hop-Pip-Tub-Pink-Gill-Wap-Mop-Trip— superior to man; so near to him in the scale Tib-Pin-Im-Win-Drop-Skip-Fick-Quickof creation as ever to be most interested in him and his pursuits, yet so far removed as to be endued with miraculous powers, and immortal years. These "wanton sprites," attaching themselves to his mansions, fields, woods, and streams, either plagued him by their mischievous and reckless pranks, according to his deserts, and their own dispositions, or assisted and rewarded him, if both were benevolent and good. Alas! alas! woe for the age which has despoiled England of her Fairies! Alas! alas! though we are aware that our lamentation will entail upon ourselves the heavy anathemas of the august S. S. O. R. A.* England, we say, since, though aware that the belief in domestic spirits, is of high antiquity, and though the Orientals, as well as certain European nations, possess their Genii, Peris, and Fairies, we are not aware that these have ever taken, or been Society for Scrubbing Off the Rust of Ages. I opine. Compositor. So far Master Poole; for other fays, at least as eminent as these, we must consult their own poet, and chronicler, one Shakspeare, in whose works are detailed some of those scandals and intrigues of the Elfin Court; which could not have been few, considering how many ladies composed it. By most writers on mythology, fairies are agreed to be a species of "devils," we shall presently see how nearly connected they are with the fabulous deities of the classic nations. An old writer, John Heywood, says: "In John Milesius, any man may read Of devils, in Sarmatia honored, Call'd Kotri, or Kobaldi, such as we Pugs, and Hobgoblins call; their dwellings be * Poole's Parnassus, Art. Fairies. + Also Titania. Also Robin Goodfellow. Demons; not in the worst sense, but in that of genii-spirits-angels. corners of old houses least frequented r beneath stacks of wood; and these convented Make fearful noise, in but t'ries and dairies, Robin Goodfellows some, some call them Fairies: n solitarie rooms these uproars keep, And beat at doors, to wake men from their sleep Seeming to force locks, be they ne'er so strong, And keeping Christmasse gambols, all night long.", Mr. Hardiman, in his interesting and eru lite "Bardic Remains of Ireland," thus accounts for the application of the name MAB, to the Fairy Queen : "The paramount fairy queen of Ireland, was Maidib, that is, mortifying (suppressing) the d, Maib, pronounced Maiv, by a common metathesis of the v, for b, in Irish. From this country, the appellation was conveyed to Scotland, and thence to the north of Eng land. There, Shakspeare found our Maib, and espoused her, Mab, to Oberon, as his fairy queen! This has escaped the poet's learned commentators." Pug, or Puck, (or Robin Goodfellow, or Friar Rush,) so called from his monkey tricks, and his sometimes assuming the form of an ape, seems, from some acts attributed to him, to be the same as the Brownie of Scotland, the " drudging goblin," and the "lubber fiend," of Milton. Robin Goodfellow, Robin Hood, Red Cap, and Hoodekin, are his synonymous titles, from the circumstance of his kind and useful labours, and from his appearing at times with a little red hood, or cap, on his head, as does, we believe, the Irish Cluricanne. Robin Hood, the outlawed Earl of Nottingham, has, we may observe, been thought to have been so termed from his wanderings in the woods, and from pranks, little less elvish than those of the unquiet and fiendish Puck. The ancients had their divinities of the elements, of the forest, house, and highway: the Germans have a wood king, or demon; the Swedes, a nickar, or fairy of rivers and lakes, where, like the Scotch kelpie, he raises storms and derives a savage satisfaction from the wreck of human life; the Germans, and we believe, the Danes also, have a water king, or sprite; the nixes, or undines, (water nymphs) of the same family, though fair and exquisite as the sirens of old, are yet devils, and tempt only to destroy. Does not our fabled mermaid, (for we would distinguish between her and sea-creatures bearing a remote resemblance to her descriptions,) originate from the Roman seamaids, or Nereids, the tradition of which would be yet faintly preserved in our islands? In mountainous countries, which generally are those of mines, cobbolds, (Kobaldi, of course,) or "old men o' the mine," hold their redoubtable sway; these are always of diminutive figure, like their brother elfs and guardians of hidden treasures. The Bogle of Scotland, is an out-of-door spirit, haunting fields, heaths, and lanes; and of in-door familiars, Brownie is one, (though not always); and the very remarkable Benshee, i. e. little, old fairy, may be reckoned another, though rather the boding spirit pertaining to a parti cular family, than an intruder upon the hose pitality, in food and shelter, of the household to which she is attached. The old man, or old, or Tom Poker of our nurseries, is a domestic or house spirit, or fairy; a kind of Puck, whose origin has been satisfactorily traced, and history, written by the versed in goblin lore, who are wiser than ourselves. We have mentioned the belief, that fairies are evil spirits, (and mischievous and malignant towards man, the acts attributed to them, are indeed, with few exceptions,) but the popular creed, whilst it denies to them the blessing of salvation, also promulges, that as an expiatory sacrifice for sin, every fairy at stated times undergoes a metamorphose into some creature, in whose form being obliged to remain for a certain term of days, he or she is liable to every danger, torment, and distress, incidental to such creature, beast, bird, fish, insect, or reptile. A creed, so repugnant to our own private tastes, and feelings, and so utterly destructive to the exquisite beauty of our greenwood elfin lore, can never find favour with us; therefore, proposing by way of compromise, the adoption by future fairy mythologists, of our own division of the elvish people into good and bad, benevolent and malevolent, we shall, in conclusion, present all interested in them, "An Excellent Waie to Gette a Faerie. "First, gett a broad square chrystall, or Venice glasse, in length and breadthe, three inches: then lay that glasse or chrystall, in the bloude of a white hen, three Wednesdayes or three Fridayes; then take it out, and wash it with holioag, and fumigate it; then take three hazel stikes, or wandes, of a year groth; pill them fair and white; and make so long as you write the spiritt, or faerie's name, which you call three times, on everie stike. Then bury them under some hill, where as you suppose faeries haunt, and the Wednesdaye before you call them, and the Fridaye following, take them uppe, and call her at eight, or ten, or three, of the clock, which be good planetts and hours for that turne; but, when you call, be clean in life, and turn your face towards the East, and, WHEN YOU HAVE HER, bind her to that stone, or glasse."—Ashmolean M. S. in the British Museum. Retrospective Gleanings. SAXON RELICS. PROBABLY no portion of history is more interesting to the English reader than that which chronicles the sway of the Saxons in this country; and, considering its remoteness, few periods have been so extensively illustrated, or have so successfully exercised |