TIONS OF A TWELFTH NIGHT.

CHRISTMAS goes out in fine style,-with Twelfth Night. It is a finish worthy of the time. Christmas Day was the morning of the season; New Year's Day the middle of it, or noon; Twelfth Night is the night, brilliant with innumerable planets of twelfthcakes. The whole island keeps court; nay, all Christendom. All the world are kings and queens. Everybody is somebody else, and learns at once to laugh at, and to tolerate, characters different from his own, by enacting them. Cakes, characters, forfeits, lights, theatres, merry rooms, little holiday faces, and last not least, the painted sugar on the cakes, so bad to eat but so fine to look at, useful because it is perfectly useless except for a sight and a moral,—all conspire to throw a giddy splendour over the last night of the season, and to send it to bed in pomp and colours, like a Prince.

And not the least good thing in Twelfth Night is, that we see it coming for days beforehand, in the cakes that garnish the shops. We are among those who do not like “a surprise," except in dramas. We like to know of the good things intended for us. It adds the pleasure of hope to that of possession. Thus we eat our Twelfth-cake many times in imagination, before it comes. Every pastry-cook's shop we pass, Aashes it upon us.

-some

Coming twelfth-cakes cast their shadows before; if shadows they can be called, which shade have none; so full of colour are they, as if Titian had invented them. Even the little ragged boys, who stand at those shops by the hour, admiring the heaven within, and are destined to have none of it, get, perhaps, from imagination alone, a stronger taste of the beatitude, than many a richly-fed palate, which is at the mercy of some particular missing relish,touch of spice or citron, or a "leetle more" egg. We believe we have told a story of one of those urchins before, but it will bear repetition, especially as a strong relish of it has come upon us, and we are tempted to relate it at greater length. There is nothing very wonderful or epigrammatic in it, but it has to do with the beatific visions of the pastry shops. Our hero was one of those equivocal animal-spirits of the streets, who come whistling along, you know not whether thief or errand-boy, sometimes with bundle and sometimes not, in corderoys, a jacket, and a cap or bit of hat, with hair sticking through a hole in it. His vivacity gets him into scrapes in the street, and he is not ultra-studious of civility in his If the man he runs against is not very big, he gives him abuse for abuse at once; if otherwise, he gets at a convenient distance, and then halloos out Eh, stupid!" or "Can't you see before you?" or [From the Steam-Press of C. & W. REYNELL, Little Pulteney-street.]

answers.

66

No. 41.

"Go, and get your face washed." This last is a favourite saying of his, out of an instinct referable to his own visage. He sings "Hokee-Pokee" and a Shiny Night," varied occasionally with an uproarious "Rise, gentle Moon," or "Coming through the Rye." On winter evenings, you may hear him indulging himself, as he goes along, in a singular undulation of yowl;;-a sort of gargle,—as if a wolf were practising the rudiments of a shake. This he delights to do more particularly in a crowded thoroughfare, as though determined that his noise should triumph over every other, and show how jolly he is, and how independent of the ties to good behaviour. If the street is a quiet one, and he has a stick in his hand (perhaps a hoop-stick), he accompanies the howl, with a run upon the gamut of the iron rails. He is the nightingale of mud and cold. If he gets on in life, he will be a pot-boy. At present, as we said before, we hardly know what he is; but his mother thinks herself lucky, if he is not transported.

PRICE THREE HALFPEnce.

edition by Ellis, p. 19.) the three kings of Collen (Cologne). The first, named Melchior, an aged man with a long beard, offered gold; the second, Jasper, a beardless youth, offered frankincense; the third, Balthaser, a black or moor, with a large spreading beard, offered myrrh." This picture is full of colour, and has often been painted. The word Epiphany (EmPavia, superapparitio, an appearance from above), alludes to the star which is described in the Bible as guiding the Wise Men. In Italy, the word has been corrupted into Beffania, or Beffana, (as in England it used to be called Piffany); and Beffana, in some parts of that country, has come to mean an old fairy, or Mother Bunch, whose figure is carried about the streets, and who rewards or punishes children at night by putting sweetmeats, or stones and dirt, into a stocking hung up for the purpose near the bed's head. The word Beffa, taken from this, familiarly means a trick or mockery put upon anyone base uses

to such may come the most splendid terms. Twelfth Day, like the other old festivals of the church of old, has had a link of connexion found for it with Pagan customs, and has been traced to the Saturnalia of the ancients, when people drew lots for imaginary kingdoms. He Its observation is still kept up, with more or less ceremony, all over Christendom. In Paris, they enjoy it with their usual vivacity. The king there is chosen, not by drawing a paper as with us, but by the lot of a bean which falls to him, and which is put into the cake; and great ceremony is observed when the king or the queen "drinks;" which once gave rise to a jest, that occasioned the damnation of a play of Voltaire's. The play was performed at this season, and a queen in it having to die by poison, a wag exclaimed with Twelfth Night solemnity, when her Majesty was about to take it, "The queen drinks." The joke was infectious; and the play died, as well as the poor queen.

Well; one of these elves of the pavé-perplexers of Lord Mayors, and irritators of the Police,-was standing one evening before a pastry-cook's shopwindow, flattening his nose against the glass, and watching the movements of a school-boy who was in the happy agony of selecting the best bun. had stood there ten minutes before the boy came in, and had made himself acquainted with all the eatables lying before him, and wondered at the slowness, and apparent indifference, of jaws masticating tarts. His interest, great before, is now intense. He follows the new-comer's eye and his hand, hither and thither. His own arm feels like the other's arm. He shifts the expression of his mouth and the shrug of his body, at every perilous approximation which the chooser makes to a secondrate bun. He is like a bowler following the nice inflexions of the bias; for he wishes him nothing but success; the occasion is too great for envy : he feels all the generous sympathy of a knight of old, when he saw another within an ace of winning some glorious prize, and his arm doubtful of the blow.

Many a pleasant Twelfth- Night have we passed in our time; and such future Twelfth-Nights as may remain to us shall be pleasant, God and good-will

At length the awful decision is made, and the permitting; for even if care should be round about bun laid hands on.

"Yah! you fool," exclaims the watcher, bursting with all the despair and indignation of knowing boyhood, "you have left the biggest!”

Twelfth-cake and its king and queen are in honour of the crowned heads who are said to have brought presents to Jesus in his cradle-a piece of royal service not necessary to be believed in by good Christians, though very proper to be maintained among the gratuitous decorations with which good and poetical hearts willingly garnish their faith. "The Magi, or Wise Men, are vulgarly called (says a note in Brand's Popular Antiquities,' quarto

them, we have no notion of missing these mountaintops of rest and brightness, on which people may refresh themselves during the stormiest parts of life's voyage. Most assuredly will we look forward to them, and stop there when we arrive, as though we had not to begin buffetting again the next day. No joy or consolation that heaven or earth affords us, will we ungratefully pass by; but prove, by our acceptance and relish of it, that it is what it is said to be, and that we deserve to have it. "The child is father to the man," and a very foolish grown-boy he is, and unworthy of his sire, if he is not man enough to know when to be like him. What shall he go and

JOURNAL

ship and of humble aspirations towards tree-planting, we are here incited to point out; for by the same token the writer of these papers planted some planetrees within the rails by the garden-gate (selecting the

We spent a Twelfth Night once, which, by common consent of the parties concerned, was afterwards known by the name of the Twelfth Night. It was

"In nature there's no blemish, but the mind ↑ [that is to say, the faults of the mind]; None can be call'd deform'd but the unkind."

The play of Twelfth Night, with proper good taste, is generally performed, at the theatres, on Twelfth Night. There is little or nothing belonging to the occasion in it, except that there are a set of merry-makers who carouse all night, and sing songs enough to "draw three souls out of one weaver." It is evident that Shakspeare was at a loss for a title to his play, for he has called it, Twelfth Night, or What You Will;' but the nocturnal revels reminded him of the anniversary which, player and humorist as he was, and accustomed, doubtless, to many a good sitting-up, appears to have stood forth prominently among his recollections of the year. So that it is probable he kept up his Twelfth Night to the last assuredly he kept up his merry and romantic characters, his Sir Tobies and his Violas. And, keeping up his stage faith so well, he must needs have kept up his home faith. He could not have done it otherwise. He would invite his Stratford friends to king and queen," and, however he might have looked in face, would still have felt young in heart

but whether anybody else, ever had such a Twelfth Night;—

"For never since created cake,
Met such untiring force, as named with these
Could merit more than that small infantry,
Which goes to bed betimes."

The evening began with such tea as is worth mention, for we never knew anybody make it like the maker. Dr Johnson would have given it his placid est growl of approbation. Then, with piano-forte, violin, and violoncello, came Handel, Corelli, and Mozart. Then followed the drawing for king and queen, in order that the "small infantry" might have their due share of the night, without sitting up too too-late (for a reasonable "too-late" is to be allowed once and away). Then games, of all the received kinds, forgetting no branch of Christmas customs. And very good extempore blank verse was spoken by some of the court (for our characters imitated a court), not unworthy of the wit and dig. nity of Tom Thumb. Then, came supper, and all characters were soon forgotten but the feasters' own; good and lively souls, and festive all, both male and female, with a constellation of the brightest eyes that we had ever seen met together. This fact was so striking, that a burst of delighted assent broke forth, when Moore's charming verses were struck

up,

"To ladies' eyes a round, boys,

We can't refuse, we can't refuse;
For bright eyes so abound, boys,

'Tis hard to choose, 'tis hard to choose."

The bright eyes, the beauty, the good humour, the wine, the wit, the poetry (for we had celebrated wits and poets among us, as well as charming women), fused all hearts together in one unceasing round of fancy and laughter, till breakfast,-to which we adjourned in a room full of books, the authors of which might almost have been waked up and embodied, to come among us. Here, with the bright eyes literally as bright as ever at six o'clock in the morning (we all remarked it), we merged one glorious day into another, as a good omen (for its was also fine weather, though in January); and as luck and our good faith would have it, the door was no sooner opened to let forth the ever-joyous visitors, than the trumpets of a regiment quartered in the neighbourhood struck up into the morning air, seeming to blow forth triumphant approbation, and as if they sounded purely to do us honour, and to say "You are as early and untired as we."

We do not recommend such nights to be "resolved on," much less to be made a system of regular occurrence. They should flow out of the impulse, as this did; for there was no intention of sitting up so late. But so genuine was that night, and so true a recollection of pleasure did it leave upon the minds of all who shared it, that it has helped to stamp a seal of selectness upon the house in which it was passed, and which, for the encouragement of good-fellow

it was sacred among the Greeks); and anybody who does not disdain to look at a modest tenement for the sake of the happy hours that have been spent in it, may know it by those trees, as he passes along the row of houses called York Buildings, in the New Road, Marylebone. A man may pique himself without vanity, upon having planted a tree; and, humble as our performance has been that way, we confess we are glad of it, and have often looked at the result with pleasure. The reader would smile, perhaps sigh (but a pleasure would or should be at the bottom of his sigh), if he knew what consolation we had experienced in some very trying seasons, merely from seeing those trees growing up, and affording shade and shelter to passengers, as well as a bit of leafiness to the possessor of the house. Every one should plant a tree who can. It is one of the cheapest, as well as easiest, of all tasks; and, if a man cannot reckon upon enjoying the shade much himself (which is the reason why trees are not planted everywhere), it is surely worth while to bequeath so pleasant and useful a memorial of himself to others. They are green footsteps of our existence, which show that we have not lived in vain.

"Dig a well, plant a tree, write a book, and go to heaven," says the Arabian proverb. We cannot exactly dig a well. The parish authorities would not employ us. Besides, wells are not so much wanted in England as in Arabia, nor books either; otherwise we should be two-thirds on our road to heaven already. But trees are wanted, and ought to be wished for, almost everywhere; especially amidst the hard brick and mortar of towns; so that we may claim at least one-third of the way, having planted more than one tree in our time; and if our books cannot wing our flight much higher (for they never pretended to be anything greater than birds singing among the trees), we have other merits, thank Heaven, than our own to go upon; and shall endeavour to piece out our frail and most imperfect ladder, with all the good things we can love and admire in God's creation.

Young trees from nursery-grounds are very cheap, and cost less than flowers.

IN BED-SOMNUS, MORPHEUS, AND THE MUSES-DAN-
GEROUS SITUATION-READING AT MEALS.

"CHRISTMAS is coming!"-ay, and before this appears in the pages of the LONDON JOURNAL, fingers will have been burnt at snap-dragon, the roast beef will have been eaten, and the plum-pudding will be nearly done, all but an end, “hard as the remainder biscuit after a voyage," which nobody thinks worth eating, and neither the cat nor dog being an epicure in respect of that dish, 'twill lay about the pantry till some shivering beggar receives it as gymnastics for his jaws and Christmas will have gone. Christmas is always coming, the bustle and hurry of the time, will never give us a moment's leisure to say, "it is here." It is almost as complete an ignus fatuus as "to-morrow," which, saith the proverb, never comes. The full twelve days may have passed ere we can soberly settle down, and think of Christmas. Indeed it is not a season favourable at all for thinking; we are too busy in action-either friends with us, or we with friends-extra children at home to be amused, or ourselves to amuse for want of them. It is after Christmas that we begin to think about it—and then -“Christmas is coming." It may be nearly a twelvemonth off, but still it is coming, and nearer than the one that has just passed over.

I have, no doubt, but that you, Mr Editor, will have preceded me with far more appropriate, pleasing' and happy remarks upon the season, as is your wont. But this morning as I was brushing my hat at my parlour window, in ancient merry Islington, a little old woman, in a dirty straw bonnet and red cloak, with her hand just peeping between the folds, as red with the cold as the cloak itself, and from the hand depending sundry (barring a pun and tout-à-contre, they were wet with the humid atmosphere) broad sheets, and, with a shiver, she emitted sounds from a cracked voice,which reminded me of Milton's line,

"Schreech'd upon their wretched reeds of scrannel straw!"

I, however, recognized the commencing salutation,—— "God save you, merry gentlemen,"

!

with its tail," said or sung," to a tune as monotonous as the Devil's Tatoo. Thinks I, this is one of the signs of the times" Christmas is coming,”—and, thinks I, further, my Hints for Table Talk' must be seasonable. Thinks I, again, if a table could talk,-this sturdy old oaken piece of furniture, for instance, with its twisted legs and shining face, may hap, could tell us of the gastronomic exploits of some of our ancestors, at dinner-times, on Christmas days, for hundred years or so. I began to think a little-the ditty of the carol-singer at the window, by dint of its monotony and in spite of its harshness, lulled me into a day-dream—the shining face of the table gathered animation--a pair of eyes gradually appeared, twinkling with mirth, a nose, and a mouth; and the mouth opened and spake thus:—" Gently! --gently whither so fast?" cries I to Myself "Did you not find fault with this very manner of proceeding, this sham day-dreaming, in your first Table Talk?' and do you now presume to make use of the very style you condemned, or at least censured, in the face of such censure? Oh, Consistency! in what obscure corner art thou now to be found?" Myself is quite abashed at this philippic, but still endeavours to justify himself to his companion, I. "The circumstances were so suitable, so tempting, the convenience so snug, and the inclination so treacherous, that I could not resist the temptation. Besides, it is but human nature to 'preach one thing, and practise another.' Moreover, every rule has an exception, and if there is no other loop-hole to escape by, I must declare that there is an exception in the case of Christmas, and shining oaken tables!" "Well, but," says I, "you might have done this thing in a neater manA much better idea would have been to have made a misty cloud suffuse the polished wood-that

ner.

cloud should gradually disperse, and a venerable old man, clad in ancient garb, should appear; or else, gazing intently on the table, you should have imagined a speck to have appeared on the shining surface, which should advance, becoming larger and larger, till it resolves itself into the form of a pigmy

man.

Still advancing, it should at last assume the image of the very John Bull of our imagination. You should have made him about to address you, when something should interrupt you, dispel the vision, and you should discover that it was only the reflection of your own image in the glass-like surface of the table." Myself, of course, acknowledges the superiority of I's idea, but asserts that he did not intend to be interrupted at all, until the apparition had delivered a fine flowing oration upon the gastronomic Christmas performances of the various generations of his existence, and have drawn a striking parallel, or rather contrast, between a Christmas now and a like festivity two hundred years ago. But I have forgotten all that I was going to make the eidolon say-not a fabric of the vision remains behind-the ideas are spilt as water upon the dry ground, which cannot be gathered up-so I shall leave Christmas in a pet, and not say anything more about it.

I

Still I will be seasonable. There is one Now, Mr Editor, which you forgot to expatiate upon in your nuncupative oration (thanks that it is not your nuncupative will). It is one that very nearly concerns me, and, I have no doubt, many of your readers. It is not one of the pleasures, but one of the uncomfortables of the season. Now, sir (pray do not frown, gentle reader, I am not going to say how dare you do such a thing, or call you to account for leaving undone such another. I have not set in array, like some would-be-benefactor, all the benefits I have conferred, and then say, "Now, young man, how could you be guilty of such ingratitude?' Neither have I just concluded an elaborate train of argument, and about to draw the conclusion with an ipse dixit, "Now Sir, since such and such is the case, so and so must be the consequence." Now for the Now.) Now the weather is so cold, that I cannot read in bed with comfort. Instead of keeping my shoulders out, I am half inclined to cover my very head with the blankets. When I read in bed, one end of the curtains must of course be tucked up to admit light, and a draught is sure to come with it; there is sure to be some inlet for the burglarious wind. It either blows under the door, down the chimney, or through some crevice somewhere about the window sash; a room can never be perfectly air-tight; and, moreover, have an aversion to boarding up the fire-place, because it is very unwholesome. Everybody knows, now-a-days, what would have been a very exclusive piece of knowledge a hundred years ago or so, that, in every mouthful of air we inhale, we consume the oxygen it contains, and reject the nitrogen; now, a bed-room were air-tight we should soon consume all the oxygen in the air, and our lungs would starve for want of food; thus we see that the oxygen may be called the flesh, and nitrogen the bones of the air. But to return to reading in bed. You thus perceive that, what with the cold, and the wind, and the love for one's lungs, clinical reading is out of the question. After various fruitless trials, I have been obliged to give it up, at least for a time, and that not until I got a delightful rheumatism in my right shoulder. I have endeavoured to keep all under the clothes but the hand with which I he'd the book; but being obliged occasionally to uncover, in some degree, to get freedom to turn over the page, the cold air would come pouring in like a bucket of water, or a blast from a forge-bellows, so this would not do, and with reluctance I have doused the glim;" and turned to woo the companion gods, Somnus and Morpheus. Had I been an ancient Pagan, a believer in the Roman Polytheism, with Hook's Pantheon for my creed, I might easily have attributed all such difficulties and annoyances to the anger of these deities, jealous that their rights and prerogatives should be incroached upon by any or either of the Muses, their authority contemned in their own dominions, and their influence set at naught within the very walls of their palace. Their

if

godships, as everyone read in mythological lore knows, are not of a nature to stand tamely by while their rights are trampled on or usurped; and in this case of reading in bed, a jury of celestials would, without doubt, decide in favour of Morpheus and Somnus. Is not the chamber their territories, the couch their palace, and the curtains their fortresses ? and is it not an insulting presumption for one who, by entering their dominions, makes himself liable to their established government, and voluntarily surrenders himself to their will, to hold friendship with, and pay court to, rival powers? 'Tis as bad as courting Shela, while your head is "pillowed on your Nora's breast," high treason against the downy gods, the due punishment of which would be the deprivation of their favours for a few nights,--a true lover's revenge. I warrant you the fickle swain would not be long under such a ban, without beseeching and imploring for a return of their smiles. Sleep to weary limbs is as soothing and delightful as the love-drawn sighs of a mistress, and the one is as necessary to the life of the man as the other is to the existence of the lover. The Muses do very well to flirt with, but Somnus and Morpheus are the persons to take for better or for worse. I must apologize for this last paragraph; two terrible blunders are committed in it; I have unsexed two gods, and supposed bigamy!

But I have a reserve army of arguments against myself, as to reading in bed. The objections just stated are all flummery in comparison to the one consideration-the danger there is of setting the house on fire. Many times and oft have I received cautions and warnings and admonitions to that effect from persons of all ages, and of both sexes, with whom I have domesticated; and, in nine cases out of ten, they have been accompanied with a prophecy that I would have the house burnt about my ears some night. I have the pleasure of rejoicing that they have all been (as yet) false prophets. I certainly was a little staggered in my obstinacy, and the pertinaciousness of my adherence to an old custom a little softened by a circumstance which happened not long since. I was, according to custom, reading LEIGH HUNT'S LONDON JOURNAL in bed; whether the article I was perusing was particularly soporific-or whether Somnus made unusual efforts to conquer me that night, I know not -but this I know, that the drowsy God succeeded in wooing me to his arms. (What a pity there is not a god of sleep of the softer sex!) When I awoke in the inorning, the black ashes of the JOURNAL were lying on the chair before my bed—a blanket and the counterpane a little singed-but no other damage done. I attribute my preservation to the thickness and weight of the counterpane, the non-inflammable nature of wool, to the curtains being tucked up, and to the instantaneous consumption of the open sheet of paper. I at that time determined to give up my favourite indulgence-and kept my determination for a week or so. I then ventured, with a great deal of caution, to read for a few minutes, and gradually returned to my custom, and am now as

venturesome as ever.

66

Methinks I hear some incredulous Mr Burchell annunciate the annoying monosyllable, Fudge !" after reading this relation ;-nay, Sir Infidel, believe it or disbelieve it as you list; but it is not only founded on fact, but fact clad in a garment of the thinnest tissuey gauze.

Why, then, do I continue such a dangerous practice, it may be asked, and at the same time argue against it? To this, I acknowledge I can give no satisfactory answer. The custom is so deep set, that I can no more sleep without it than a gentleman without his bottle of wine, the bachelor without his glass of grog, or the workman without his pipe and pint. I own that I am in the wrong, and mean to leave off the custom some day. It is not at all uncommon for one to undergo with calmness a danger which he would shudder to see another undergo. So I would advise all to abstain from reading in bed, as a custom fraught with danger; but, for myself, I'must lament that now it is so cold that I cannot read in bed with comfort.

BOOKWORM.

ROMANCE OF REAL LIFE.

NO. LII.-GOETHE'S ADVENTURE WITH HIS DANCINGMASTER'S DAUGHTERS.

(From his Autobiography.)

GOETHE is charged with having given too self-complacent an account of the various attachments to him when he was young; and, what is less easy to be excused, with having encouraged, and then broken them up, with a little too much facility, and like a man of the world. His admirers say, on the other hand, that all this only fell within the natural course of events in the life of such a man; and that, whatever weakness may have been mixed with it at the time, it was turned to better account by him ultimately than could have been done by others, and became part of that universality of experience which made him so great a writer. We leave the readers of his Autobiography to judge for themselves, being equally loth to speak lightly of what might have caused much distress to others, and to offend the laurels of a head which grew old in wisdom and renown, not, in all probability, without its sufficient portion of regret, as well as self-reconcilement. In the tragic-comic instance before us, whatever may be the poet's selfcomplacency in relating the adventure at all, the case does not appear to tell against him as in others; and, where there is a doubt, the charitable conclusion is much oftener the just one, than prejudice is willing to suppose.

"Whilst employed myself in various studies and researches, I did not neglect the pleasures incident to youth. At Strasburg, every day and hour offers to sight the magnificent monument of the Minster, and to the ear the movements and music of the dance. My father himself had given my sister and me our first lessons in this art. We had learned the grave minuet from him. The solos and pas-de-deux of the French theatre, whilst it was with us at Frankfort, had given me a greater relish for the pleasures of dancing; but from the unfortunate termination of my love affair with Margaret, I had intirely neglected it. This taste revived in me at Strasburg. On Sundays and holidays, joyous troops, met for the purpose of dancing, were to be seen in all directions. There were little balls in all the country-houses, and nothing was talked of but the brilliant routs expected in the winter. I was therefore apprehensive of finding myself out of my element in company, unless I qualified myself to figure as a dancer; and I accordingly took lessons of a master recommended by one of my friends. He was a true French character, cold and polished. He taught

with care, but without pedantry. As I had already had some practice, he was not dissatisfied with me.

He had two daughters who were both pretty, and the elder of whom was not twenty. They were both good dancers. This circumstance greatly facilitated my progress, for the awkwardest scholar in the world must soon have become a passable dancer with such agreeable partners. They were both extremely amiable; they spoke only French. I endeavoured to appear neither awkward nor ridiculous to them, and I had the good fortune to please them. Their father did not seem to have many scholars, and they lived very much alone. They several times asked me to stay and converse after my lesson, which I very readily did. I was much pleased with the younger one; the manners of both were very becoming; the elder, who was at least as handsome as her sister, did not please me so much, although she took more pains to do so. At the hour of my lesson she was always ready to be my partner, and she frequently prolonged the dance. The younger, although she behaved in a friendly manner towards me, kept a greater distance, and her father had to call her to take her sister's place.

I durst not return to the two sisters the next day.

On the third day Emily sent to desire me to come to them without fail. I went accordingly. Towards the end of the lesson, Emily appeared: she danced a minuet with me; she never displayed so much grace, and the father declared he had never seen a handsomer couple dancing in his room. After the lesson, the father went out, and I inquired for Lucinda. "She is in bed," said Emily, "but do not be uneasy; when she thinks herself ill, she suffers the less from her afflictions: and whatever she may say, she has no inclination to die, it is only her passion that torments her. Last night she declared to me that she should certainly sink under her grief this time, and desired that, when she should be near her end, the ungrateful man who had gained her heart, for the purpose of ill-treating her, should be brought to her." "I cannot reproach myself with having given her any reason to imagine me in love with her," I exclaimed; "I know one who can very well testify in my favour on this occasion." "I understand you," answered Emily. "It is necessary to come to a resolution to spare us all much vexation. Will you take it ill if I entreat you to give over your lessons? My father says you have now no further occasion for them; and that you know as much as a young man has occasion to know for his amusement." "And is it you, Emily, who bid me banish myself from Yes, but not merely of my your presence?" own accord. Listen to me: after you left us the

the cards for you; the same fortune appeared thrice, and more clearly each time. You were surrounded

One evening, after the dance, I was going to lead the elder to the apartment, but she detained me. "Let us stay here awhile," said she, "my sister, I must own to you, is at this moment engaged with a fortune-teller, who is giving her some intelligence from the cards respecting an absent lover, a youth extremely attached to Emily, and in whom all her day before yesterday, I made the fortune-teller cut hopes are placed. My heart," continued she, “is free; I I shall often see the gift of it desuppose spised." On this subject I paid her some compli“You may,” said I, "consult the oracle, and then you will know what to expect. I have a mind to consult it likewise: I shall be glad to ascer tain the merit of an art in which I have never had much confidence." As soon as she assured me the operation was ended, I led her into the room. We found her sister in good humour, she behaved to me in a more friendly manner than usual. Sure, as she seemed to be, of her absent lover, she thought there was no harm in showing some attentions to her sister's, for in that light she regarded me.

ments.

We engaged the fortune-teller, by the promise of a handsome recompense, to tell the elder of the young ladies and me our fortunes also. After all the usual preparations and ceremonies, she shuffled the cards for this beautiful girl; but, having carefully examined them, she stopped short, and refused to explain herself. "I see plainly," said the younger of the girls, who was already partially initiated into the mysteries of this kind of magic, "there is something unpleasant which you hesitate to tell my sister." The other sister turned pale, but, recovering herself, entreated the sibyl to tell her all she had seen in the cards without reserve. The latter, after a deep sigh, told her that she loved, but was not beloved in return; that a third stood between her and her beloved; with several other tales of the same kind. The embarrassment of the poor girl was visible. "Let us see whether a second trial will be more fortunate,” said the old woman, again shuffling and cutting the cards, but it was still worse this time. She wished to make a third trial, in the hopes of better success, but the inquisitive fair one could bear it no longer, and burst into a flood of tears. Her beautiful bosom was violently agitated. She turned her back on us and ran into the next room. I knew not what to do; inclination retained me with her sister, compassion urged me to follow the afflicted one. "Console Lucinda," said the former; "go to her."

"How can

I console her," said I, "without showing her the least signs of attachment? I should be cold and reserved. Is this the moment to be so? Come with me yourself.""I know not," replied Emily, "whether my presence would be agreeable to her." We were, however, going in to speak to her, but we found the door bolted. In vain we knocked, called, and intreated Lucinda no answer. "Let us leave her to recover herself," said Emily; "she will see no one." What could I do? I paid the fortune-teller liberally for the harm she had done us, and withdrew.

by friends, by great lords,—in short, by all kinds of happiness and pleasure; you did not want for money; women were at a certain distance from you: my poor sister, in particular, remained afar off. Another was nearer to you, and I will not conceal from you that I think it was myself. After this confession you ought not to take my advice amiss. I have promised my heart and hand to an absent friend, whom I have hitherto loved above all the world. What a of whom would torment you with her passion, the situation would be yours, between two sisters, one other with her reserve; and all this for nothing-for a momentary attachment; for even had we not known who you are, and the hopes you have, the cards would have informed us. Farewell," added she, leading me to the door; "and since it is the last time we shall see each other, accept a mark of friendship which I could not otherwise have given you." At these words she threw her arms round my neck and gave me a kiss in the most tender manner.

At the same instant, a concealed door opened, and her sister in a pretty morning undress, rushed towards us, and exclaimed, "You shall not be the only one to take leave of him." Emily let me go. Lucinda embraced me, and held me closely to her bosom. Her beautiful black hair caressed my face. She remained some time in this situation, and thus I found myself between the two sisters in the distressing predicament that Emily had warned me of. At length Lucinda, quitting her hold of me, fixed her eyes on me with a serious air, then walked up and down the room with hurried steps, and at length threw herself upon a sofa. Emily approached her, but Lucinda pushed her back. Then commenced a scene which I still recollect with pain. It was not a theatrical one, there was but too much truth in the passion of this young and lively Frenchwoman.

Lucinda overwhelmed her sister with reproaches. "This," said she, "is not the first heart favourably disposed towards me that you have deprived me of. It was the same with that absent friend whom you drew into your snares before my eyes! You have now robbed me of this one, without relinquishing the other. How many more will you take from me? I am frank and artless; people think they know me well, and therefore they neglect me. You are calm and dissembling; they think to find some. thing wonderful in you; but your outward form covers a cold and selfish heart, which only seeks victims."

Emily had seated herself near her sister, she remained silent. Lucinda, growing warmer, entered

into particulars to which it did not become me to listen. Emily endeavoured to pacify her, and made me a sign to retire. But jealousy has the eyes of Argus; and this sign did not escape Lucinda's notice. She arose, came towards me, looked me in the face with a pensive air, and said: "I know you are lost to me. I renounce all pretension to you: but as to you, sister, he shall no more be yours than mine. Saying this, she embraced me again, pressed my face to hers, and repeatedly joined her lips to mine. tion.

"And now," she cried, "dread my maledicWoe on woe, eternal woe to her who shall first press those lips after me! Embrace him now if you dare. I am sure that Heaven has heard me. And you, sir, retire without delay.”

I did not wait for a repetition of the command: and I left them with a resolution never more to set foot in a house where I had innocently done so much mischief."

spect of the Week preceding. VARIOUS causes have induced us to wish to give something of an Almanac in our present year's JOURNAL, not of the kind more properly so called, but on the side of the ornamental part of utility; and we should be glad of any suggestions that would enable us to improve what is here done. We began á series of Birth-days in our first volume, but were tempted to notice them at too great length for our convenience. In our new mode of handling them, we trust that our endeavours to be brief as well as characteristic, will enable us both to continue to the end and to be more numerous; but the week before us augured a bad beginning, for it supplies us with no birth-days at all!—at least none that we are aware of, worth mention; especially as our main object, in these lists, is to remind people of names that have greatly influenced the world, or for some other reason carry a degree of enthusiasm with them, and incite us to recall them as those of friends and benefactors,perhaps to toast them as immortals, whose birthdays we still keep. We, therefore, thought it best to violate our usual prospective plan this once, and look back to the week that is past; and we have done this the more willingly, because, in fact, our year will thus be complete; which it otherwise would not, as our first Wednesday in January falls so late as the 7th. We have not, as in the former instance, taken the trouble of calculating the chronological variation occasioned by the change of the Calendar in the year 1752. We leave that to such as may think it necessary. The great point is to have a day of recollection for an eminent name; and there is something in the sound of the old date which has an advantage, if we choose to be content with it. It was the one to which he and his friends were accustomed.

We propose, in addition to Birth-days, to notice such Holidays or Saints'-days as retain an interest with the lovers of old times and books.

And we have added a monthly Flower-Garden, or notices of such plants as flower in this country in the open air, and could be cultivated by any one of very moderate resources, so as to furnish his homestead with the perpetual presence of sweet odours and colours all the year round. Our list is grounded on that in the Household Almanac ; as that of our Birth-days is upon the authorities furnished by the British Almanac.'

of present effect, and a jealousy of whatever did not emanate from himself.

2. General Wolfe, 1727, at Westerham, in Kent, the conqueror of Canada, and reputed author of the fine song beginning—

"Why, soldiers, why,

Whose business 'tis to die,
Should we be melancholy, boys?"

The story of his death, which gave rise to West's celebrated picture, has been contradicted. Not so a saying attributed to George the Second, who upon being told that Wolfe was a madman, exclaimed, "I wish he would bite all my other generals.".

3. Cicero, 107, Before Christ. The great Roman special pleader-the lawyer of antiquity-the child of the old age of Roman virtue, when words began to be taken for things the only great man ever made by vanity. Mr Bentham, in his latest work, says, that from his earliest years he was shocked with the "baseness" of Cicero's character (we think those are his words, for we have not the passage at hand to refer to). The censure is harsh, and early judgments are apt to be rash; but it is awkward where they remain the same in old age. Certainly it is impossible not to feel a salutary disgust at the insincerity and worldliness exhibited in much of Cicero's conduct, even as recorded by himself; in his Letters,' for instance, where he will recommend an acquaintance in one letter, and abuse him and undo the recommendation in the next. Yet vanity itself often made this insincere man in carnest; and, in spite of his timidity and time-serving, he was sometimes a bold patriot. We confess we cannot like him.

6. Twelfth Day, Old Christmas Day, or the Epiphany. (See our first Article.) It is called Twelfth Day, because of its so dating from Christmas Day.

- Joan of Are, 1402, at Domremi, near Vaucouleurs, on the borders of Lorraine; called the Maid of Orleans from her compelling the English to raise the siege of that city, the first of a series of successes, originating in her belief that she had a divine mission, and ending in her capture by the enemy, and her pitiable death at the stake for a witch. Joan was a genuine enthusiast, of a noble and trusting nature; and her death was a disgrace to all parties,- -to the enemy for its revenge, and to her friends for their desertion of a benefactress. A complete history of her appeared not long since in two volumes, with interesting documents which throw the clearest light on her character.

- Pietro Metastasio, 1693, at Rome. The poet of the serious opera,-of a courtly and no very great genius, but fit for his task; a good writer for music, with occasional tenderness and pathos.

7. St Distaff's Day, when the holidays are reckoned to be over, and maids in old times rcsumed their spinning. But our ancestors went to work again by liberal degrees :

JANUARY GARDEN PLANTS IN FLOWER.
We are not sure

Laurustinus (Viburnum Tinus. of the etymologies of these words). The shrub is well known, with its leaves not very like laurel, and its pretty red and white bunches of flowers. It is not certain, what species of viburnum Virgil means, when he speaks of "inter viburna cupressi; "the cypresses amidst the viburna; but the image suggests an agreeable picture of tall trees amidst underwood.

Bearsfoot (Helleborus fœtidus, Ill-scented Hellebore; said to be called Hellebore, from two Greek words, implying to catch the breath, or suffocate, in the eating. But the derivation appears very forced). Green flowers. This plant, "from its green and finely divided leaves," says Mr Loudon's ' "Encyclopædia,'" forms a most ornamental evergreen bush for the shrubbery."

Garden Anemone (Anemone hortensis — Garden

Wind-flower, the word Anemone coming from a Greek word signifying the wind. The accent is properly on the o, Anemone, but custom has made the popular pronunciation the right one. Some say the flower is so called, "because it opens only when the wind blows; others, because it grows in situations much exposed to the wind."-Flora Domestica.

Colours, red, blue, or white. It may be had in bloom every month, if planted every month. The poets have attributed the colour of the Anemone to the blood of Adonis, and the tears, or nectar, of Venus. Moschus calls upon it to mourn with him for the death of his brother poet, Bion :— Ανθεα νυν συγνοισιν αποπνείοιτε κορύμβοις. Νυν ῥοδα φοινίσσεσθε τα πενθιμα, νυν ανεμώνα. Νυν ύακινθε λαλει τα σα γραμματα, και πλεον αι αι Λαμβανε σοις πεταλοισι καλος τεθνακε μελίκτας. "Ah now, ye flow'rs, turn your sweet breaths to sighs;

Ye roses now, and ye, anemonies,
Gloom with your reds, as though there were no

sun;

And more than ever now, O hyacinth, shew
Your written sorrows;*-the sweet singer's dead.
There was a little lawny islet,

By anemone and violet, Like Mosaic, paven."

Beginning of a fragment by Shelley. Christmas Rose (Helleborus Niger, Black Hellebore).

Rose-colour, varying in depth. This is the "black hellebore" of Spenser's Garden of Proser. pina; in which, amidst the poisonous and sleepy flowers, he put a silver scat," thus intimating the riches and delicacy of the involuntary goddess of the lower regions, who was compelled to recreate herself in such a place, instead of her flowery Sicilian vallies.

There mournfull cypresse grew in greatest store; And trees of bitter gall; and heben* sad; Dead sleeping poppy; and black hellebore; Cold coloquintida,† and tetra‡ mad; Mortall samuitis ;§ and cicuta || bad, With which th' unjust Athenians made to die Wise Socrates, who, thereof quaffing glad, Pour'd out his life and last philosophy 'To the fair Critias, his dearest belamy.

"Pour'd out his life and last philosophy." How beautiful, and true!

The Garden of Prosérpina this hight: And in the midst thereof a silver seat, With a thick arbour goodly over dight, In which she often used from open heat Herself to shroud, and pleasures to entreat,Next thereunto did grow a goodly tree, With branches broad dispredd, and body great, Clothed with leaves that none the wood mote see, And loaden all with fruit as thick as it might bee. Their fruit was golden apples, glistering bright. Hence the Golden Apples of the Hesperides, of Atalanta, of Acontius and Cydippe, and the Apple of Discord which Paris presented to Venus, and which brought death upon Troy. This Garden of Proserpine would make a fine, deep-toned subject for a painter.

Yellow Hellebore (Eranthis Hyemalis, Winter Earth-flower); commonly called Winter-Arconite. Sweet Coltsfoot (Tussilago fragrans, sweet-smelling Tussilage or Cough-plant).

"

"Best kept in pots," says Mr Loudon in his Enclopedia of Plants,' "because it is apt to run.' It is occasually used as a remedy for coughs. Snow Drop (Galanthus Nivalis, Snowy Milkflower). The word " drop" beautifully expresses its pensile Alluding to the marks on the ancient hyacinth (the turk's-cap lily), which sometimes form themselves into shapes like the words ai, ai, and were supposed to utter those exclamations of mourning for the death of Hyacinthus, whom Apollo accidentally slew with a quoit. ⚫ Ebony. + Bitter Gourd. Supposed Sabine or Savine-tree.

Deadly nightshade. Hemlock.