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turn, therefore, to our walk,-what do all these strange objects look like, that stand silently about us in the dim twilight, some spiring straight up, and tapering as they ascend, till they lose themselves in the green waters above-some shattered and splintered, leaning against each other for support, or lying heavily on the floor on which we walk-some half buried in that floor, as if they had lain dead there for ages, and become incorporate with it? what do all these seem, but wrecks and fragments of some mighty vessel, that has sunk down here from above, and lain weltering and wasting away, till these are all that is left of it! Even the floor itself on which we stand, and the vegetation it puts forth, are unlike those of any other portion of the earth's surface, and may well recall, by their strange appearance in the half light, the fancies that have come upon us when we have read or dreamt of those gifted beings, who, like Ladurlad in Kehama, could walk on the floor of the sea, without waiting, as the visiters at watering-places are obliged to do, for the tide to go out.

Stepping forth into the open fields, what a bright pageant of summer beauty is spread out before us!-Everywhere about our feet flocks of wild-flowers

"Do paint the meadow with delight." We must not stay to pluck and particularize them; for most of them have already had their greeting-let us pass along beside this flourishing hedge-row. The first novelty of the season that greets us here is perhaps the sweetest, the freshest, and fairest of all, and the only one that could supply an adequate substitute for the hawthorn bloom which it has superseded. Need the eglantine be named? the "sweet-leaved eglantine;" the "rainscented eglantine;" eglantine-to which the sun himself pays homage, by "counting his dewy rosary" on it every morning; eglantine which Chaucer, and even Shakspeare--but hold-whatsoever the poets themselves may insinuate to the contrary, to read poetry in the presence of nature is a kind of impiety: it is like reading the commentators on Shakspeare, and skipping the text; for you cannot at tend to both to say nothing of nature's book being a vade mecum that can make every man his own poet" for the time being; and there is, after all, no poetry ike that which we create for ourselves.

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Begging pardon of the eglantine for having permitted any thing-even her own likeness in the poet's looking-glassto turn our attention from her real self,look with what infinite grace she scatters her sweet coronals here and there among her bending branches; or hangs them, half-concealed, among the heavy blossoms of the woodbine that lifts itself so boldly above her, after having first clung to her for support; or permits them to peep out here and there close to the ground, and almost hidden by the rank weeds below; or holds out a whole archway of them, swaying backward and forward in the breeze, as if praying of the passer's hand to pluck them. Let who will praise the hawthorn-now it is no more! The wild rose is the queen of forest flowers, if it be only because she is as unlike a queen as the absence of every thing courtly can make her.

The woodbine deserves to be held next in favour during this month; though more on account of its intellectual than its personal beauty. All the air is faint with its rich sweetness; and the delicate breath of its lovely rival is lost in the luscious odours which it exhales.

These are the only scented wild flowers that we shall now meet with in any profusion; for though the violet may still be found by looking for, its breath has lost much of its spring power. But, if we are content with mere beauty, this month is perhaps more profuse of it than any other even in that department of nature which we are now examining-namely, the fields and woods.

The woods and groves, and the single forest trees that rise here and there from out the bounding hedge-rows, are now in full foliage; all, however, presenting a somewhat sombre, because monotonous, hue, wanting all the tender newness of the spring, and all the rich variety of the autumn. And this is the more observable, because the numerous plots of cultvated land, divided from each other by the hedge-rows, and looking, at this distance, like beds in a garden divided by box, are nearly all still invested with the same green mantle; for the wheat, the oats, the barley, and even the early rye, though now in full flower, have not yet become tinged with their harvest hues. They are all alike green; and the only change that can be seen in their appearance is that caused by the different lights into which each is thrown, as the wind

passes over them. The patches of purple or of white clover that intervene here and there, and are now in flower, offer striking exceptions to the above, and at the same time load the air with their sweetness. Nothing can be more rich and beautiful in its effect on a distant prospect at this season, than a great patch of purple clover lying apparently motionless on a sunny upland, encompassed by a whole sea of green corn, waving and shifting about it at every breath that blows.

The hitherto full concert of the singing birds is now beginning to falter, and fall short. We shall do well to make the most of it now; for in two or three weeks it will almost entirely cease till the autumn. I mean that it will cease as a full concert; for we shall have single songsters all through the summer at intervals; and those some of the sweetest and best. The best of all, indeed, the nightingale, we have now lost. So that the youths and maidens who now go in pairs to the wood-side, on warm nights, to listen for its song, (hoping they may not hear it,) are well content to hear each other's voice instead.

We have still, however, some of the finest of the second class of songsters left; for the nightingale, like Catalani, is a class by itself. The mere chorus-singers

of the grove are also beginning to be silent; so that the jubilate that has been chanting for the last month is now over. But the Stephenses, the Trees, the Patons, and the Poveys, are still with us, under the forms of the woodlark, the skylark, the blackcap, and the goldfinch. And the first-named of these, now that it no longer fears the rivalry of the unrivalled, not seldom, on warm nights, sings at intervals all night long, poised at one spot high up in the soft moonlit air.

We have still another pleasant little singer, the field cricket, whose clear shrill voice the warm weather has now matured to its full strength, and who must not be forgotten, though he has but one song to offer us all his life long, and that one consisting but of one note; for it is a note of joy, and will not be heard without engendering its like. You may hear him in wayside banks, where the sun falls hot, shrilling out his loud cry into the still air all day long, as he sits at the mouth of his cell; and if you chance to be passing by the same spot at midnight, you may hear it then too.*

Yet by him who holds this " Mirror," we must not be "charmed" from our repose, but take the advice of a poet, the contemporary and friend of Cowper.

Let us not borrow from the hours of rest,
For we must steal from morning to repay.
And who would lose the animated smile
Of dawning day, for the austere frown of night?
I grant her well accoutred in her suit

Of dripping sable, powder'd thick with stars,
And much applaud her as she passes by
With a replenish'd horn on either brow!

But more I love to see awaking day

Rise with a fluster'd cheek; a careful maid,

Who fears she has outslept the custom'd hour,

And leaves her chamber blushing. Hence to rest;
I will not prattle longer to detain you
Under the dewy canopy of night.

Hurdis.

June 1.

Ovid assigns the first of June to "Carna," the goddess of the hinge; who also presided over the vital parts of man, especially the liver and the heart. Massey,

commenting on his taste, cannot divine
the connection between such a power and
the patronage of hinges.
"False no-
tions," he says, "in every mode of reli-
gion, lead men naturally into confusion."

Mirror of the Months.

Carna, the goddess of the hinge, demands
The first of June; upon her power depends
To open what is shut, what's shut unbar;

And whence this power she has, my muse declare ;
For length of time has made the thing obscure,
Fame only tells us that she has that power.
Helernus' grove near to the Tiber lies,
Where still the priests repair to sacrifice;

From hence a nymph, whose name was Granè, sprung,
Whom many, unsuccessful, courted long;

To range the spacious fields, and kill the deer,

With darts and mangling spears, was all her care;

She had no quiver, yet so bright she seemed,

She was by many Phoebus' sister deemed.

Ovid.

The poet then relates that Janns made this Granè (or Carna) goddess of the hinge

And then a white thorn stick he to her gave,
By which she ever after power should have,
To drive by night all om'nous birds away,
That scream, and o'er our houses hov'ring stray.

NATURALISTS' CALENDAR.
Mean Temperature... 57 • 05.

June 2.

A ROGUE IN GRAIN, June 2, 1759. To the Editor of the Every-Day Book.

Newark, Notts, May 17, 1826. Sir, It appears to me that there have been in "old times," which we suppose "good times," rogues in grain. To prove it, I herewith transmit the copy of an advertisement, from the "Cambridge Journal" of 1759. Wishing you an increasing sale to your interesting EveryDay Book, I remain, &c.

BENJAMIN JOHNSON.

ADVERTISEMENT.

WHEREAS I WILLIAM MARGARETS the younger, was, at the last Assizes for the County of Cambridge, convicted upon an indictment, for an attempt to raise the price of Corn in Ely-market, upon the 24th day of September, 1757, by offering the sum of Six Shillings a Bushel for Wheat, for which no more than Five Shillings and Ninepence was demanded; And whereas, on the earnest solicitation and request of myself and friends, the prosecutor has been prevailed upon to forbear any further prosecution against me, on my submitting to make the following satisfaction, viz upon my paying the sum of £50 to the poor inhabitants of the town of Ely; and the further sum of £50 to the poor inhabitants of the town of

Cambridge, to be distributed by the Minister and Church-wardens of the several parishes in the said town; and the full costs of the prosecution; and upon my reading this acknowledgment of my offence publicly, and with a loud voice, in the presence of a Magistrate, Constable, or other peace officer of the said town of Ely, at the Market-place there, between the hours of twelve and one o'clock, on a public market-day, and likewise subscribing and publishing the same in three of the Evening Papers, printed at London, and in the Cambridge Journal, on four different days; and I have accordingly paid the two sums of £50, and Costs; and do hereby confess myself to have been guilty of the said offence, and testify my sincere and hearty sorrow in having committed a crime,

which, in its consequences, tended so
much to increase the distress of the poor,
in the late calamitous scarcity: And I do
hereby most humbly acknowledge the
lenity of the prosecutor, and beg pardon
of the public in general, and of the town
of Ely in particular. This paper was
read by me at the public Market-place at
Ely, in the presence of Thomas Aungier
Gentleman, chief constable, on the 2d Day
of June, 1759, being a public Market-
day there; and is now, as a further proof
of the just sense I have of the heinous-
ness of my crime, subscribed and pub
lished by me

WILLIAM MARGARETS
Witness, JAMES DAY,
Under Sheriff of Cambridgeshire.

passes over them. The patches of purple or of white clover that intervene here and there, and are now in flower, offer striking exceptions to the above, and at the same time load the air with their sweetness. Nothing can be more rich and beautiful in its effect on a distant prospect at this season, than a great patch of purple clover lying apparently motionless on a sunny upland, encompassed by a whole sea of green corn, waving and shifting about it at every breath that blows.

of the grove are also
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The hitherto full concert of the singing birds is now beginning to falter, and fall short. We shall do well to make the most of it now; for in two or three weeks it will almost entirely cease till the autumn. I mean that it will cease as a full concert; for we shall have single songsters all j through the summer at intervals; and those some of the sweetest and best. The best of all, indeed, the nightingale, w have now lost. So that the youths and maidens who now go in pairs to the wood-side, on warm nights, to lister. its song, (hoping they may not her are well content to hear each other's instead.

We have still, however, som finest of the second class of so. for the nightingale, like Ca class by itself. The mere c

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To the Editor of the Every-Day Book. Kennington, May 23, 1826. nexed is an original unprinted

lady Arabella Seymour, tunes were of a peculiar from peculiar causes; those to be traced to that tyrannic at weak sovereigns always have persons approaching their equals, in mind, or by family ties. The folng notices have been gleaned from most authentic sources, viz. Lodge's Illustrations of British History," "The Biographia Britannica," &c. The letter is in the Cotton collection of Manuscripts, in the British Museum, Vespasian. F.III.

nger to me but onely by sight, yet the good opinion 1 of your worth, together wt the great interest you have in is favour, makes me thus farre presume of your willingeted gentlewoman that good office (if in no other respect yet stian) as to further me wt your best indeuors to his Lo. that helpe me out of this great distresse and misery, and regaine I which is my chiefest desire. Whearin his Lo. may do a deede l and honorable to himselfe, and I shall be infinitely bound to his en to you, who now till I receive some comfort from his May rest the most sorrowfull

creatore liuing

Arbella Seymaure

Arabella Stuart, whose name is hardly entioned in history, except with regard to sir Walter Raleigh's ridiculous conspiracy, whereby she was to have been placed on a throne, to which she had neither inclination nor pretensions, and by means unknown to herself, was the only child of Charles Stuart, fifth earl of Lennox, (uncle to king James I., and great grandson of king Henry VII.,) by Elizabeth, daughter of sir William Cavendish of Hardwick. She was born about the year 1578, and brought up in privacy, under the care of her grandmother, the countess of Lennox, who, for many resided in England. Her double to royalty was obnoxious to the f queen Elizabeth, and the king James I., who equally

dreaded her having legitimate issue, and restrained her from allying herself in a suitable manner. Elizabeth prevented her from marrying Esme Stuart, her kinsman, and heir to the titles and estates of her family, and afterwards imprisoned her for listening to some overtures from the son of the earl of Northumberland. James, by obliging her to reject many splendid offers of marriage, unwarily encouraged the hopes of inferior pretenders, among whom, says Mr. Lodge, was the fantastical William Fowler, secretary to Anne of Denmark. Thus circumscribed, she renewed a connection with William Seymour, grandson to the earl of Hertford, which, being discovered in 1609, both parties were summoned to appear before the privy council, where they

* Communicated by Mr. Johnson, of Newark.

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