current at home when they set out on their pilgrimage, and here they have remained in good use ever since."-Pp. 203-5 We said formerly, that at the time of its appearance, Captain Hall's book upon South America was the best which had been published;-we are by no means sure, but that we may not now with justice say the same of his book upon North America. The Foreign Review, and Continental Miscellany. No. conductors of this periodical on their punctuality and ac- munication of life to an inert mass. In our opinion, that was but child's play to the materialising of mind which is here recorded as matter of history. It is the fairy-land of our exploded nursery books, where kings and queens walk about and sleep with crowns on their heads, realised. While perusing the work of Constantine, we do not wonder that the imperial city fell before the fierce onset of Muhammed, but only that its inhabitants were not found by him petrified, like those we read of in the Arabian Nights. We have sat spell-bound in the icy fetters of a formal English dinner party; we have endured the night-mare infliction of a Berlin literary tea-drinking; we have travelled in a Dutch treck-schuyt; but even with the aid of these reminiscences, our fancy struggles in vain to image satisfactorily the wooden life of Byzantium. Christian Biography; a Dictionary of the Lives and THIS is a very excellent publication. It is remarkably cheap, it is well written, and is without any sectarian spirit, or a wish to elevate one denomination at the expense of another. Mr Jones, we believe, is a member of the Baptist persuasion, and is already favourably known to the public, by his History of the Waldenses, his Biblical Cyclopædia, and other works. This compendium of Christian Biography is worthy of the reputation he has acquired. We have to object, however, that it is by no means so complete as we could have wished. Mr Jones, indeed, makes his readers acquainted with many distinguished names; but there are also many whom he has omitted altogether, and of whom something ought to have been said in a work of this nature. Why has he omitted Fisher Bishop of Rochester, Archbishop Abbot, Bishop Morton of Durham, Archbishop Matthews of York, Archbishop Sharpe of York, the learned Selden, Archbishop Sancroft, Andrew Melville, Henry Scougall, George Wishart, Alascus, and many other great and distinguished men, both churchmen and dissenters, whom it is needless here to particularize, but who ought to have found a place, and who were, to say the least, as well deserving of a notice in such a work as Thomas Amory, David Bogue, Timothy Dwight, Samuel Ecking, Archibald M'Lean, or a number of others, in the accounts of whom Mr Jones has been more than ordinarily prolix? We hope that he will attend to this hint in a future edition, and thus make his work a still more complete catalogue rai tablished or dissenting churches. The Vestry Library, Vol. I. Hall's Contemplations. Edited by Thomas Russell, A. M. London. Holdsworth and Ball. 12mo. Pp. 400. 1829. Constantini Phorphyrogeniti Imperatoris de Cerimoniis sonné of every remarkable individual, whether in the esAula Byzantina. Libri Duo. Bonnæ. 1829. THE indefatigable philologists of Bonn have just pub.. lished the first volume of this work. Viewed apart, its literary merits are not great, and the information it contains none of the most interesting. But standing as an integral part of the series of Byzantine historians, (which we formerly noticed,) it contains much that throws light on their darker passages, and helps to complete the picture of the court of Byzantium. We gape at the accounts given us by travellers of the strict etiquette and ceremonial of the courts of Ava and Pekin; but this volume shows that there has been another court, little if at all inferior to these. The Emperor of Constantinople, in the tenth century, seems to have slept and waked, eat, drank, prayed, given audience, and taken exercise, according to a prescribed formula. Nay, his subjects had the manner in which they were to testify their loyalty enforced upon them by statute. We seem transported into a world of form and outward show, beneath which there beats no human heart. Punch and Judy (we mean the wooden images, not the vivifying principle behind the curtain) are sensitive and intelligent beings in comparison with the actors in this gorgeous spectacle. It was thought a bold fancy in Mrs Shelley to pourtray the com brary, " is above all others distinguished by the unparal"THE present era," says the Editor of the Vestry Lileled efforts which are made for the diffusion of scientific is a very true remark. We really think that, in the difand general knowledge." This is not a very new, but it ferent departments of printing and engraving, this country has now got nearly to the topmost spoke in the literary ladder; and we humbly imagine, that two or three years at most will suffice to bring the bibliographical arts the ingenuity or ability of man to go farther. What imto such a pitch of perfection, that it will be impossible for lennium arrives, it is impossible for us to say; but until provements may take place when Edward Irving's Milthat happy period makes its appearance, we are of opinion that "The skill of artists can no farther go." The exterior of the Vestry Library is not very much in its favour, but it has "that within which passeth show." It is to contain a reprint of good, substantial works, on religious subjects. The first volume, now before us, presents us with a work which has been before the world for two centuries, and which has, many a long year ago, passed through the ordeal of criticism with no small credit to its author. The "Contemplations" of Joseph Hall, the good bishop of Norwich, is a book which Philip Doddridge (no mean authority,) has pronounced to be "incomparable for language, criticism, and devotion." This is praise sufficient without any addition of ours; and, wishing it all success, we leave the Vestry Library to find its way into as many Session Rooms on this side of the Tweed as possible. MISCELLANEOUS LITERATURE. THE EDITOR IN HIS SLIPPERS; A PEEP BEHIND THE SCENES. "Stulta, jocosa, canenda, dolentia, seria, sacra; secluded coves and bays, or standing upon gently-rising A gorgeous and imposing procession accompanied us from Burntisland to Aberdour, which we entered in triumph. We have seldom seen a village exert itself more emphatically to do honour to an illustrious visitant. Old Aberdour poured forth its two hundred inhabitants to meet us, and from the Earl of Morton's alone came forty additional spectators, who gazed upon us with a feeling almost approaching awe. In new Aberdour the bell of the church was set a-ringing, and the streets were strew We have just returned from a brief ramble along the coast of Fife. We sojourned for two days in that ancient kingdom. The ground was somewhat new to us, and of all things in this earth we delight in novelty. We are strongly inclined to suspect that by far the greater majority of the inhabitants of Edinburgh have a very faint and indefinite notion of Fife. Walking down North Hanover, Frederick, or Castle Street, or slowly pacing along Queen Street, they see in the far distance across the Frith of Forth, some blue and apparently barren hills; and, though they probably imagine that, on the other side of these hills, there is a civilized district of some extent, they never for a moment suppose that on this side there is any thing but sloping, unploughed fields, coming downed with flowers. We desired to be conducted to the harto the sea shore. Now this is a geographical error of some magnitude, though it is one out of which we confess that we ourselves have been only very lately emancipated. We had heard of the Fife Ferries, and seen long and most mysterious debates concerning them recorded in the newspapers; but what the Fife Ferries were, we thank Heaven, we were as ignorant as the child unborn. However, as Fife was the only corner of Europe we had left unexplored, we suddenly conceived the resolution of visiting it, and judging for ourselves. Having added one or two codicils to our will, and taken an affectionate farewell of our family and friends, we embarked on board a steam-boat at Newhaven, and soon afterwards found ourselves careering through the mighty deep. We stood on the poop, and waving a hand-the snowy whiteness and gentlemanly delicacy of which has been long the subject of popular admiration-we exclaimed, with Childe Harold" My native land, good night!" (We should have said "good morning," for it was about ten A.M., but the poetical license may be pardoned, considering the excited state of our feelings.) We very soon cleared the Roads, where several ships were lying at anchor; and we soon afterwards descried Inchkeith on our starboard beam, reposing in the deep solitude of the main ocean. About this time a seal passed athwart our bows, and created a considerable sensation, being, at first sight, mistaken, by all the passengers and some of the crew, for a whale. But the Captain, who appeared to be a man of skill, assured us that we were not yet in a sufficiently northern latitude to meet with whales. This information allayed the fears of the ladies, who, having nothing else to do, immediately grew sea-sick, and hung over the sides of the vessel. As we neared the coast of Fife, it became, of course, more distinctly visible; and our astonishment was not small to discover that it was thickly studded with towns and villages, either peeping out, like birds' nests, from little bour, where Kirkham's magnificent barge having been It was two o'clock in the morning when we knocked at the door of the Bell Inn of Kirkaldy, kept by Mrs Lowe. Little did the fair damsel who gave us admission, guess who was crossing the threshold; and little did the smart waiter who brought us supper conceive who was devouring his cold chicken! We felt like Alfred in the neat herd's cottage; or Peter the Great in the wood-yard at Rotterdam. All this time we had worn boots, but now we ordered SLIPPERS. There was a faltering in our voice as we pronounced the word, which almost betrayed us. The slippers were produced, but such slippers!-gay, red, cockney affairs, into which our expansive feet would scarcely peep. The whole force of our affections for the slippers we had left behind burst forth at once, and we exclaimed despairingly, "Heu! quantum minus est cum reliquis versari, Quam tui meminisse!" In the whole world --- in the whole universe in all space---there is but one pair of slippers like those by which we have been rendered immortal, and to which we have returned the compliment. We walked next day seven or eight miles through Kirkaldy, the west end of which, we are informed, was never yet reached by any traveller who entered from the east, or the east by any one who entered from the west. Captain Cochrane, who walked to Kamtschatka, tried to walk through Kirkaldy, but failed, having been taken dangerously ill when he had got about half-way. It is called "the long town of Kirkaldy;" but what its length really is, remains to be discovered by some future Mungo Park, Bruce, or Clapperton. At length, perceiving the citizens beginning to make preparations for our advent, which they expected would take place in the course of that day, we flung ourselves into a carriage-andfour, galloped first to Kinghorn, and then to Pettycur, where we found a steam-boat ready to sail, and were once more safely landed at Newhaven, almost before the people of Kirkaldy had made the appalling discovery that we had been among them, without their knowing it! "Encore, après un an, je te revois, Arbate." Once more behold us in our study, restored, dear reader, to thee, and to our slippers. Have we not cause for mutual congratulation? After all," there is no place like home.” What a mountain of new books, and what an uncountable number of letters, await our return! It will take us hours merely to open them. But now that the evening sunlight is streaming into our room, we shall light our pastilles of sandal-wood, whose odorific smoke will mingle with the breath of flowers, and surround us with a dreamy and delicious atmosphere, as, stretched along the sofa with the marble table by its side, we proceed to select from our papers an agreeable oglio for that most intellectual and valuable class of the community---the readers and admirers of the EDINBURGH LITERARY JOURNAL. And what, in the present instance, can be more appropriate to begin with than the following spirited effusion, with the sentiments expressed in which, the author assures us, that all mankind heartily coincides?-- TO THE EDITOR IN HIS SLIppers. 'Tis not for men of simple rhyme, I'd sweep such scribblers off the earth— The "NOCTES" still may rule the night, And North and Hogg be whippers Of dulness; but a brighter light Shall glow around thy SLIPPERS. In shoes thou canst a Tartar prove,- Now, in thy bark late launch'd on fame, A score of bards are skippers, There dulness lives not, and the race If gratitude by man is due To knowledge-box equippers, The Greek Pashas, and Afric chiefs,— And modest beauty, jealous grown,--- The corner of thy SLIPPERS. And if an humble genius pine, Wedged in misfortune's nippers,→→ How blest if one kind word of thine Should link him with thy SLIPPERS! What need of more ?---though I could wear The fingers off my flippers, In multiplying rhymes, to bear Upon thy deathless SLIPPERS. tations to dinner-parties, to pic-nic parties, to aquatic We next open twenty-seven cards, which contain inviparties, to fêtes-champêtres, to the houses of country gentlemen, to public meetings, and to every kind of entertainment to which invitations are ever sent. We rarely or never answer any of these cards, but when the day comes, we go if we are in the mood, and if not, they must do the best they can without us. We are not naturally vain, but the adulation of a too partial world has those cards, over which we have just happened to cast our a slight tendency towards making us so. Here is one of eye, from as excellent a fellow as breathes,---one who has boarded many an enemy's ship, sword in hand, and is he belongs. He is not now quite so young as he has now at the very top of the honourable profession to which been, but he still retains all the enthusiasm and warm feelings of youth. He writes to us from Plymouth, whence he is just about to sail on a short cruise : -- AN INVITATION FROM THE OLD COMMODOre." My pennant streams over the waters The Swan's on its mountain of snowAdieu! then, Edina's sweet daughters: Afloat !---Oh! afloat we must go! Come sup with old Neptune with me, sir; I vow 'twere a horrible pity, When summer is laughing around. Then leave all the devils behind you, The printers, the green, and the blue: Odd's blood! sir, and let me remind you, A Nautical Journal is new. Consider, my dear Mr Editor, How with sea stores we'll be cramm'd When every subscriber's a creditor, Every opponent is d-d! Off!---off with your long gown and slippers; In summer you scribblers should roam : 'Tis better to blow out with skippers, Than fall out with lubbers at home. Odd, zooks! when the zephyrs are blowing, Away! oh! away o'er the billows; Away! my old hearty, with me: You'll find us a set of good fellows, And July's the month for the sea! circumstances; she put the best face on it possible--brought up her lee-way---steadied her pace to a miracle---cocked her head---and, from her very anxiety to disguise her unsteadiness, immediately tripped, stumbled, and all but came in contact with the person of her pastor. Dr C. saw Tibby's situation, and knew her general character as well as her foible, so, continuing that benignity of countenance which was natural to him, he proceeded to rally Tibby in the following terms:--"Hout, tout, Tibby, woman, ye're reeling, I see.' Tibby heard the assertion, and being more accustomed to the professional than to the English sense of the term, incontinently and gaily rejoined, "Weel, minister, ye ken a body canna aye be spinnin'." We have said before that Glasgow contains several poets. The following Sonnet is by a new aspirant, and SONNET TO A curious document was lately put into our hands, it does him no discredit : which, we believe, has never before been given to the public, and a copy of which we have pleasure in being now able to lay before our readers. It is an original letter in the handwriting of George III., addressed to his friend and preceptor, the Earl of Bute, shortly after his accession in 1761. It is interesting in several points of view, and particularly as it contains the original order for the pension that was settled upon Home, the author of "Douglas," and places the character of our late monarch in the most amiable, and, we may say, endearing light. We print it verbatim as it is in the original :- UNPUBLISHED LETTER OF GEORGE IIL MY DEAREST FRIEND,---In looking over the list we made together, I feel myself still in debt, particularly to poor Home; no office occurs to me that I think fit for him; I, therefore, desire you would give him £300 per anuum out of my privy purse, which mode will be of more utility to him, as it will come free from the burthen of taxes, and infamous fees of office. I have a double satisfaction in giving Home this mark of my fayour, as I know the execution of it will be as agreeable to my dearest friend as the directing it is to myself. I remain, My dear Friend, yours, &c. Sunday Morning, Eight. GEORGE, R. The reader will not fail to remark, among other things, the phrase" the infamous fees of office"-as something remarkable in the lips of a King. The date, too,---" Sunday Morning, Eight,"--indicates the most regular and healthy habits. We love to study variety; so we shall next present our readers with TIBBY AND THE MINISTER. An unpublished Anecdote. The late venerated Dr C., of Cupar, was in the habit of taking his evening walk, on the high-road, in the immediate neighbourhood of the town. During one of these stated excursions, he had occasion to meet several people returning from Ceres market, whose conversation and step indicated that Ceres and Bacchus had not been separated. Amongst the rest, a well-known, canty little body, of the name of "Tibby Brown," hove in sight, manifestly after having made, as was sometimes Tibby's practice, a little too free with a certain little stoup, which contains a gill. Tibby was a character, and though somewhat addicted to a glass at orra times, was a welldoing body upon the whole, kept a clean well-swept house, a sonsy cat, and a cheerful tongue in her head, what time the minister paid her a visit. Tibby, however, had that day disposed of some sale yarn, and had tithed the price to the amount of a cheerful glass with the merchant who purchased it. Tibby was close upon her pastor, ere she perceived him, and finding it impossible to retreat, did, what most people would have done in her *****. A day-a summer day of sunshine, with Mr Brydson, who has already appeared in our pages, and who is, besides, the author of a small volume of poetry, also resides, we believe, in Glasgow. The two following pieces are by him, and contain much of that gentle, meditative pensiveness, for which we like his style. He always writes pleasingly : STANZAS, OCCASIONED BY SEEING THE FOLLOWING COUPLET ON ONE OF THE WINDOW-PANES OF AN OLD AND SECLUDED COUNTRY MANSION: Janet Wilson and Catharine Gray Though fair and peaceful is the scene, I love it better when ye say, Ye tell me not of midnight balls That through the heart a sunshine spread, And left it gloomy as the walls From which their tapers fled ;No midnight revels-ye but say, "Here spent we many a happy day." No diary of sun and shower, Of fashion's dull variety, Small the memorial-yet to me Of birch-embower'd walks at noon, Where to no ear the hermit stream, Save yours, fair maids, its fitful tune Murmur'd as in a dream Yes, ye have wander'd thus-ye say, "Here spent we many a happy day." Of tales beside the winter hearth, When storms were up amid the night, But only added to your mirth, And made the fire more bright— These balmy eves-these nights and days- 'Tis eloquent that parting lay "Tis tender--and I will not seek To dash the trickling tear away From off my burning cheek, That falls in grief, because ye say, "Here spent we many a happy day?" SONNET, ON RECOVERING A LOST COPY OF HENRY KIRKE WHITE'S POEMS. Back to my bosom come, thou early friend; Strange changes have I seen since last with thee I sat beneath mine own laburnum tree, And turn'd thy well-known pages to an end, And watch'd the rays of summer eve descend, Like blessings on the quiet roof of home, And heard the little voice that bade me come To sing the ev'ning psalm. And thou didst lend Thy pictured stores to beautify the dream That hung around me through the silent night, Bringing loved forms. Ah, little did I deem Few years would sweep them from my waking sight!— This comfort visits my lone heart with thee, That these shall meet me in eternity. In a different strain is the following successful imitation of the livelier sort of old south-country ballad. It is a communication from a Kirkcudbright correspondent : AULD JANNET BAIRDA SANG TO ITS AIN TUNE. Chorus. Auld Jannet Baird, auld Jannet Baird, Auld Jannet Baird was a changewife o' fame, Auld Jannet could brew a browst o' gude ale, Auld Jannet Baird was baith gaucy an' sleek, Auld Jannet Baird had a purse fu' o' gowd, An' wha was sae bein or sae braw 's Jannet Baird ? Auld Jannet grew wanton, auld Jannet grew braw, Auld Jannet grew skeich, an' auld Jannet grew crouse, The clack o' sic beinness broucht customer's routh, To crack wi' the carlin an' slocken their drouth; An' mony's the wooer who vow'd and declared, He'd sell his best yaud to win auld Jannet Baird. But Jannet had secretly nourish'd for lang The wooer that's hooly is oftentimes crost, An' words wared on courtin' are often words lost; The marriage was settled, the bridal day set, LOVE AT ONE GLIMPSE; OR THE GLASGOW GENTLEMAN AND THE LADY. Some years ago, there used to be pointed out, upon the streets of Glasgow, a man whose intellects had been unsettled upon a very strange account. When a youth, he had happened to pass a lady on a crowded thoroughfare-a lady whose extreme beauty, though dimmed by the intervention of a veil, and seen but for a moment, made an indelible impression upon his mind. This lovely vision | shot rapidly past him, and was in an instant lost amidst the commonplace crowd through which it moved. He was so confounded by the tumult of his feelings, that he could not pursue, or even attempt to see it again. Yet he never afterwards forgot it. With a mind full of distracting thoughts, and a heart filled alternately with gushes of pleasure and of pain, the man slowly left the spot where he had remained for some minutes as it were thunderstruck. He soon after, without being aware of what he wished, or what he was doing, found himself again at the place. He came to the very spot where he had stood when the lady passed, mused for some time about it, went to a little distance, and then came up as he had come when he met the exquisite subject of his reverie---unconsciously deluding himself with the idea that this might recall her to the spot. She came not; he felt disappointed; he tried again; still she abstained from passing. He continued to traverse the place till the evening, when the street became deserted. and by, he was left altogether alone. He then saw that all his fond efforts were vain, and he left the silent, lonely street at midnight, with a soul as desolate as that gloomy terrace. By He For weeks afterwards he was never off the streets. wandered hither and thither throughout the town, like a forlorn ghost. In particular, he often visited the place where he had first seen the object of his abstracted thoughts, as if he considered that he had a better chance of seeing her there than any where else. He frequented every place of public amusement to which he could purchase admission; and he made the tour of all the churches in the town. All was in vain. He never again placed his eyes upon that angelic countenance. She was ever present to |