This saint was the first abbess of Minster, in the isle of Thanet, founded by king Egbert about 670, in satisfaction for having murdered his two nephews, Etheldred and Ethelbright; to which satisfaction he was "miraculously terrified, by seeing a ray of bright light dart from the heavens upon their grave." In 1033, her remains were removed to St. Augustine's monastery at Canterbury, and venerated above all the relics there, and worked miracles, as all saints' relics did in those favoured times. The churches of St. Mildred, Bread-street, and St. Mildred in the Poultry, London, are dedicated to her.* In St. Mildred's church in the Poultry, Thomas Tusser, whose "Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandrie" have been cited in former pages of this work, was buried, and on his tomb this ΕΡΙΤΑΡΗ. Here THOMAS TUSSER, clad in earth, doth lie, That sometime made The pointes of Husbandrie : By him then learne thou maist; here learne we must, When all is done, we sleepe, and turne to dust: And yet, through Christ, to Heaven we hope to gee; Who reades his bookes, shall find his faith was so.t St. Ulrick. Of this saint, who died the 28th of February, 1154, Butler says little. "THE FLOWERS of the LIVES of the most renowned SAINCTS of the three kingdoms, England, Scotland, and Ireland, written and collected out of the best authours and manuscripts of our nation, and distributed according to their feasts in the calendar, By THE R. FATHER, HIEROME PORTER, Priest and Mouke of the holy order of Sainct Benedict, of the Congregation of England, Printed at * Butler's Lives of the Saints. 1 Stow. DOWAY with licence, and approbation of the Ordinary, M.Dc.XXXII," relates of this saint, that he was born in a village called Lenton, or Litton, near Bristol, with many marvels concerning him, and among them this-He became a priest, but kept hawks and dogs for sport, till he met a beggar who asked alms, Ulrick said, he did not know whether he had aught to bestow: "Look in thy purse," quoth the beggar, "and there thou shalt find twopence halfpenny." Ulrick finding as he was told, received thanks, and a prophecy that he should become a saint, whereupon he starved and hermitized at Hessleborough, in Dorsetshire, about thirty miles from Exeter. "The skin only sticking to his bones," his daintiest food was oaten-bread and water-gruel. He passed many nights without sleep, never slept but when he could not keep awake, and never went to bed, "but, leaning his head to a wall, he tooke a short allowance;" and when he awoke, "he would much blame and chastise his body, as yielding vnto ouermuch nicenesse." His pillow was ropes of hay, his clothing poor, and lined next the skin with a rough shirt of hair-cloth, till his flesh having overcome its uneasiness, he wore next his skin an iron coat of mail. In the sharpest cold of winter, having first put off his iron shirt, he was wont to get into a vessel of cold water and recite psalms. His coat of mail hanging below his knees, he went to the knight who gave it to him, to take counsel therein. His military adviser persuaded him to send it to London to be cut; but he gave the knight "a payre of sheares." The knight hesitated, the other entreated. "The one falls to his prayers, the other endeavours with iron and steale to cut iron and steale, when both their labours tooke prosperous effect; for the knight, in his cutting worke, seemed rather to divide a piece of cloath than a peece of iron." Then the saint, "without any sheeres, pulled asunder the little rings of that part of his coate cutt off, and distributed them charitably to all that desired, by virtue whereof manie diseases were cured." Envying such rare goodness, an infernal spirit, in most horrible shape, dragged him into the church, and ran him round the pavement, till the apparition of a virgin stopped this rude behaviour; however, the infernal took advantage of the saint when he was sick, and with a staff he had in his hand gave him three knocks on the head, and departed. The devil tormented him other ways; he cast him into an intolerable heat, then he gave him an intolerable cold, and then he made him dream a dream, whereby the saint shamed the devil by openly confessing it at church on Easterday before all the people. At length, after other wonders, "the joints of his iron coate miraculously dissolved, and it fell down to his knees." Upon this, he foretold his death on the next Saturday, and thereon he died. Such, and much more is put forth concerning St. Ulrick, by the aforesaid "Flowers of the Saincts," which contains a prayer to be used preparatory to the perusal, with these words, "that this holy reading of their lives may soe inflame our hearts, that we may follow and imitate the traces of their glorious example, that, after this mortall life, we may be made worthie to enjoy their most desired companie." FLORAL DIRECTORY. Navelwort. Cynoglossum omphalodes. Dedicated to St. Mildred. CHRONOLOGY. On the 20th of February 1749, Usher Gahagan, by birth a gentleman, and by education a scholar, perished at Tyburn. His attainments were elegant and superior; he was the editor of Brindley's beautiful edition of the classics, and translated Pope's "Essay on Criticism' into Latin verse. Better grounded in learning than in principle, he concentrated liberal talents to the degrading selfishness of robbing the community of its coin by clipping. During his confinement, and hoping for pardon, he translated Pope's "Temple of Fame," and his "Messiah," into the same language, with a dedication to the duke of Newcastle. To the same end, he addressed prince George and the recorder in poetic numbers. These efforts were of no avail. Two of his miserable confederates in crime were his companions in death. He suffered with a deeper guilt, because he had a higher knowledge than ignorant and unthinking criminals, to whom the polity of society, in its grounds and reasons, is unknown. Accomplishments upon vice are as beautiful colours on a venomous reptile. Learning is a vain show, and knowledge mischievous, without the love of good ness, or the fear of evil. Children have fallen from careless parents into the hands of the executioner, in whom the means of distinguishing between right and wrong might have become a stock for knowledge to ripen on, and learning have preserved the fruits to posterity. Let not him despair who desires to know, or has power to teach There is in every human heart, BREAKFAST IN COLD WEATHER. "Here it is," says the "Indicator," "ready laid. Imprimis, tea and coffee; secondly, dry toast; thirdly, butter: fourthly, eggs; fifthly, ham; sixthly, something potted; seventhly, bread, salt, mustard, knives and forks, &c. One of the first things that belong to a breakfast is a good fire. There is a delightful mixture of the lively and the snug in coming down into one's breakfast-room of a cold morning, and seeing every thing prepared for us; a blazing grate, a clean table-cloth and tea-things, the newly-washed faces and combed heads of a set of good-humoured urchins, and the sole empty chair at its accustomed corner, ready for occupation. When we lived alone, we could not help reading at meals and it is certainly a delicious thing to resume an entertaining book at a particularly interesting passage, with a hot cup of tea at one's elbow, and a piece of buttered toast in one's hand. The first look at the page, accompanied by a coexistent bite of the toast, comes under the head of intensities." THE SEASON. The weather is now cold and mild alternately. In our variable climate we one day experience the severity of winter, and a genial warmth prevails the next; and, indeed, such changes are not unfrequently felt in the same day. Winter, however, at this time breaks apace, and we have presages of the genial season Oxen, o'er the furrow'd soil, Urging firm their annual toil; Trim cottages that here and there, Speckling the social tilth, appear: And spires, that as from groves they rise, Tell where the lurking hamlet lies: Hills white with many a bleating throng, And lakes, whose willowy banks along, Herds or ruminate, or lave, Immersing in the silent wave. The sombre wood-the cheerful plain, Green with the hope of future grain : A tender blade, ere Autumn smile Benignant on the farmer's toil, Gild the ripe fields with mellowing hand, And scatter plenty through the land. Baron Smith. She was a penitent, asked public pardon or her sins with a rope about her neck, punished her flesh, and worked miracles accordingly. Sts. Thalasius and Limneus. St. Thalasius dwelt in a cavern, " and was endowed with extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost; but was a treasure unknown to the world." St. Limneus was his disciple, and "famous for miraculous cures of the sick," while his master "bore patiently the sharpest cholics, and other distempers, without any human succour St. Baradat. This saint lived in a trellis-hut, exposed to the severities of the weather, and clothed in the skins of beasts.* FLORAL DIRECTORY. Herb Margaret. Bellis perennis. Dedicated to St. Margaret, of Cortona. SPORTING CALENDAR. A valued correspondent obliges the Every-Day Book with an original sketch, hasty and spirited as its hero, when the Butler's Saints. sports of the field allured him from the pursuits of literature at college, and the domestic comforts of wife and home. dar To the Editor. To disemburthen oneself of ennui, and to find rational amusement for every season of the year, is a grand desideratum in life. Luckily I have hit on't, and beg leave, as being the properest place, to give my recipe in the Everlasting Calenyou are compiling. I contrive then to give myself employment for every time of year. Neither lively Spring, glowing Summer, sober Autumn, nor dreary Winter, come amiss to me; for I have contrived to make myself an Universal Sportsman, and am become so devoted a page of Diana, that I am dangling at her heels all the year round without being tired of it. In bleak and frozen January, besides sliding, skating in figures, and making men of snow to frighten children with, by means of a lantern placed in a skull at the top of them, I now and then get a day's cock shooting when the frost breaks, or kill a few small birds in the snow. In lack of other game, a neighbour's duck, or goose, or a chicken, shot and pocketed as I sally out to the club dinner, are killed more easily than my dairymaid does it, poor things! In February, the weather being rainy or mild, renders it worth my while to send my stud into Leicestershire for hunting again; and so my white horse Skyscraper, my old everlasting chestnut Silvertail, the only good black in the hunt Sultan, and the brown mare Rosinante, together with Alfana the king of the Cocktails, a hack or two, and a poney for errands, are "pyked off" pack and baggage for Melton; and then from the first purple dawn of daylight, when I set off to cover, to the termination of the day with cards, I have plenty of rational amusement. Next month, forbearing March hares, I shoot a few snipes before they are all gone, and at night prepare my fishing tackle for April, when the verdant meadows again draw me to the riverside to angle. My wife has now rational employment for the rest of the Summer in catching and impaling the various flies of the season against my trout mania comes, which is usual early in May, when all her maids, assist in this flyfowling sport. I have generally been successful in sport, but I shall never forget my disappointment 291 when on throwing in a flyline which was 66 Progenie longa gaudes captare Johannes. But, oh! the 12th day of August, that mountain holiday, ushered in by the ringing of the sheep bell-'tis then that, jacketed in fustian, with a gun on my shoulder, and a powder horn belted to my side, I ramble the rough highland hills in quest of blackcocks and red game, get now and then a chance shoť at a ptarmagan, and once winged a Capercaille on a pine tree at Invercauld. In hurrying home for the First of September, I usually pass through the fens of Lincolnshire, and there generally kill a wild duck or two. You must know I have, besides my pointers, setters, and spaniels, water dogs of every sort. Indeed my dog establish to a farmhouse, disguised as a ratcatcher, But now I come to thy shrine, O lovely Septembria, thou fairest nymyh in Diana's train, with rolling blue eyes as sharp and as true as those of a signal lieutenant; I come to court thee again, and may thy path be even paved with the skulls of partridges. Again I come to dine with thee on the leveret's back or pheasant's wings. We've wildboars' bladders for wine bottles, ramshorns for corkscrews, bugles for funnels, gunpowder for snuff, smoke for tobacco, woodcock's bills for toothpicks, and shot for sugar plums! I dare not proceed to tell you how many brace of birds Ponto and I bag the first day of shooting, as the long bow, instead of the fowling piece, might be called my But enough rodomontading. weapon. I now come to October. Pheasants by all that's volatile! And then, after go to my tailor and order two them, suits-scarlet for master Reynard, and a bottlegreen jacket for the harriers, topboots, white corderoy inexpressibles, and a velvet cap. Then when the covers ring again with the hallowed music of harriers, I begin skylarking the gates and setting into wind to follow the foxhounds in November. When The dusky night rides down the sky, And the Huntsman winds his horn. With three days in the week chace, and pretty little interludes of hunting with beagles, or of snipe shooting, I manage to get through December to the year's end. My snug Winter evenings are spent in getting ready my guns, smacking new hunting whips, or trying on new boots, while my old hall furnishes ample store of trophies, stags' horns hunted by my great grandfather, cross bows, guns, brushes won on rivals of Pegasus, and all sorts of odd old fashioned whips, horns, and accoutrements, hanging up all round, which remind me of those days of yore when I remember the old squire and his sporting chaplain casting home on spent horses all bespattered from the chase, before I had ridden any thing but my rocking horse. There then have I rational amusement all the year round. And much and sincerely do I praise thee, O Diana! greatest Diana of the Ephesians! at thy feet will I repose my old and weatherbeaten carcass at last, and invoke thy tutelary protection for my old age, thou who art Hunting, Shooting, and Fishing personified, the true DIVA TRIFORMIS of Antiquity. Imminens Villæ tua Pinus esto, I have the honour to remain, JACK LARKING. AN ADDRESS TO THE MOON, To a "proper new" tune. ORIGINAL. No!-I have nothing new to say, There's many a weary mile before ye— And (mindful not to let thee slip His fingers) bid thy moonship stay And list, what he might have to say Yet I do love thee !-and if aught The muse can serve thee, will petition Her grace t' attend thine airy court, And play the part of first musicianBut "ode," and "lines," "address," and " sonnet," "To Luna dedicate," are now So plentiful, that (fie upon it!) She'll add no glory to thy brow, But tell thee, in such strains as follow, That thy mild sheen beats Phosphor hollow! That thou art" fairest of the fair," Tho' Phoebus more that's grand possesses, That tree and tower reflect thy glare, And the glad stream thy ray confesses, That, when thy silvery beams illumine The landscape, nature seems bedight With loveliness so rare, that few men Have e'er been blessed with such a sight! And all such moonshine :—but enough Of this tame "milk and water" stuff. A February 23. St. Serenus, A. D. 307. St. Milburge. B. Dositheus. St. Peter Damian, Card. Bp. A. D. 1072. St. Boisil, Prior of Melross. St. Milburge, 7th Cent. She was sister to St. Mildred, wore a hair cloth, and built the monastery of Wenlock, in Shropshire. One day being at Stokes, a neighbouring village, brother Hierome Porter says, that "a young gallant, sonne to a prince of that countrey, was soe taken with her beautie, that he had a vehement desire to carrie her away by force and marrie her." St. Milburge fled from him and his companions till she had passed a little brook, called Corfe, which then suddenly swelled up and threatened her pursuers with destruction, wherefore they desisted. She ordered the wild geese who ate the corn of her monastic fields to be gone elsewhere, and they obeyed her as the waters did. After her death, her remains were discovered, in 1100, by two children sinking up to their knees in her grave, the dust whereof cured leprosies, restored the sight, and spoiled medical practice. A diseased woman at Patton, drinking of the water wherein St. Milburge's bones were washed, there came from her stomach "a filthie worme, ugly and horrible to behold, having six feete, two hornes on his head, and two on his tayle." Brother Porter tells this, and that the "worme was shutt up in a hollow piece of wood, and reserved afterwards in the monasterie, as a trophie, and monument of S. Milburg, untill by the lascivious furie of him that destroyed all goodnes in England, that, with other religious houses, and monasteries, went to ruine."* Hence the "filthie worme" was lost, and we have nothing instead but the Reformation. FLORAL DIRECTORY. Apricot. Prunus Armeniaca. Dedicated to St. Milburge. THE SEASON. If ice still remain let those who tempt it beware: The frost-bound rivers bear the weight Of many a vent'rous elf; Let each who crowds to see them skate For, like the world, deceitful ice Who trusts it makes them rue : 'Tis slippery as the paths of vice, And quite as faithless too. Porter's Flowers of the Saints |