The cause of our quarrel with the Chinese is all smoke!

The Naturalist's Library, vol. cccxxx. Irish Bulls, by Paddy Lardner, LL.D., &c. &c. Specimen :In the new edition of the editor's luminous work on the Steam Engine (part I. p. 22), speaking of two brothers, named Isaac and Solomon De Caus, he acutely remarks, that from their Christian names they were probably Jews!"

The result of Tom Duncombe's motion to rescind the Lord Chamberlain's order against the delivery of astronomical lectures during Lent, is extremely gratifying. Did the saints who opposed the motion ever read the sublime words of the Psalmist: "The heavens proclaim the glory of God; and the firmament announces the work of his hands?"

- PARLIAMENTARY LATIN.— "Tu es elegans homo, tu es !" (you're a nice man, you are!) said Sibthorp, the other day, to D'Israeli, as the latter entered the House with unimpeachable "kids," and a bran-new hat, set upon three curls. "Tu es alius!" (you're another!) was Ben's reply. Hawes rose at that moment to astonish the House. "Proh deos pisciculosque ! said Sib, "cerevisiam haud tenuem de sese existimat " (oh, ye gods and little fishes! He don't think small beer of himself.)— "Cochleare est simplex!" (he's a mere spoon!) was Ben's rejoinder. AN ACUTE PHILOLOGIST.-The "ponderous levity man of the Examiner, whose floundering at tempts at wit have been latterly of the purest feather of lead, makes the following brilliant discovery, in an article on the corn law debate, in which he proposes to substitute the word artocracy for aristocracy: "In the Lord's Prayer, apros is the word used for bread." Most probable: there being no other word signifying bread in the Greek language. Yes, doubtless, apros is the word used for

bread! If it were otherwise, the petition would somewhat resemble the Irishman's version: "Give us this day our daily potatoes." This illustration is the more appropriate, because it smacks of bulls. Potatoes, too, is good Greek, as we find by the following line in the Odyssey :“ Αυταρ έπει ταρπησαν ἔδητνος ἤδε TOTTOS" (Potetos.)—Odyss. 5, 201. We have printed the last word in the English character for the benefit of the writer in the Examiner, who, from the above specimen, plainly knows nothing of Greek.

With respect to the China debate, in which there was a great rattling of cups and saucers to no earthly use, we have but one remark to make, and it is from Cicero: "Parvi sunt foris arma, nisi est consilium domi!"

The only point, connected with China, on which Lord Palmerston seems to have roused himself, was that of the "pin." This "pin-point" is quite characteristic of the Whig administration, which has a head, and so has a pin.

PATENT EXTINGUISHERS : BRADSHAW'S INVENTION.-A large supply may be had at the Canterbury Factory, warranted of the purest brass, and most serviceable for bringing luminous politica! discussions to a summary close.

Bradshaw now finds it impossible to get a pair :"None but himself can be his parallel." "Grave Thoughts on a Future State," by W. Merry.

"A Letter on Tithe Commutation," by A. Taylor, cabbage-gardener.

THIS is the age of female literary productiveness. The needle is, upon all sides, exchanged for the pen, and fans for foolscap. Grammatically speaking, the Row now takes the feminine article, which is never declined. Let the self-styled lords of the creation look to it, for we are beating them fast out of the field, with their own long-usurped weapons. Our bodkins, we take it, will presently replace their swords at parade; and female eloquence, in which we have an indisputable superiority, may soon make whiskered individuals scarce in both forum and

senate.

Look to the gems of the publishing world:

-"The smiling rows Of chubby duodecimos!" We have the plays of the Princess Amelia, of Saxony (wonderful efforts for one of her rank), translated by Mrs. Jameson. We have, by the same authoress, a new edition of the excellent Memoirs of the Beauties of the Court of Charles II.; the élite of the English aristocracy of that day, and therefore, (need we say?) the

[1840.

finest forms of beauty in the world. We have the historical memoirs of the queens of England, admirably recorded by a female hand. We have also, in active production, the pens of Lady Blessington and Lady E. S. Wortley and Mrs. Gore and Mrs. Trollope; and a sister of the order of Mercy (a punster might say, that nun's absent from her post) illustrating the works of mercy with pen and with pencil, both of them très spirituelles. We have Mrs. Austin, too, translating from the German into her own nervous English, Ranke's History of the Popes.

In Paris, George Sand (La Baronne Dudevant) and the Comtesse Dash, and Mme. Emile de Girardin, are in active operation, and the latter has boldly taken to task the journalists of France, thrusting her hand, with marvellous insousiance, into that nest of hornets, and lecturing them after a very terrible fashion, in her Ecole des Journalistes.

But, to crown all, we have Lady Morgan taking up the fertile theme of woman's wrongs, battling with lusty zeal in the same arena in which

Mary Wolstonecroft and Mrs. Grimstone won their laurels before her, and challenging man as the intellectual inferior, rather than the equal, of woman. In "Woman and her Master," the title of Lady Morgan's book, just published by Colburn, the authoress quotes the song of Deborah, and mentions the belief entertained by several writers, that it served as a model to Homer. What think you of this, our fair but inerudite readers? One thing, at least, is certain, that Deborah's sublime song has the great distinction of preceding Homer's great epic by fully thirteen centuries. We trust that the wearers of beards will sing small after this piece of information. We shall not enter into Lady Morgan's rather one-sided views of history, or into her ingenious defence of such characters as Faustina and Messalina, but shall quote her philosophical view of the character of Helena, the mother of Constantine.

"But, what was of far greater import and weight, he placed her at the head of his exchequer, when a new system was struggling to establish its despotism over men's minds, for which the agency of wealth was especially wanted, to give a uniform direction to the impulses of fanaticism, to concentrate the rising power of opinion, and to mould it to the purposes of state policy. However humiliating to the reason of the age, however injurious to the purity of truth, such an agent was well adapted to the circumstances of the contingency. The savage cruelty and wasteful devastations of a rapidly disorganizing society called for any check that policy could devise, and almost justified any means that could stop the current of calamity, and give repose to the wretched species.

"To quell passion by dogma, to idealize existence, to give a new spring to an exhausted and purposeless civilization, and to tame the passions by subduing the intellect, if not the noblest expediency, was that alone suited to the actual condition of man. Judging also by the experience of three hundred years, this influence of wealth was, humanly speaking, necessary to pre

serve the new religion from being divided and subdivided, till its essence should be lost in inextricable dispute, and to prevent it from becoming another and supererogatory cause of dissension and discord. The momentary advantage was indeed great; but it was purchased at no less a price than a long and perfect prostration of intelligence to authority-by the sleep of a thousand years, and a subsequent struggle of principle, of which even the nineteenth century cannot foreshow the term.

In bringing about this new phasis of Christianity, and thus re-modelling society, Helena was a principal, and, as may be supposed from her antecedents, a sincere and zealous agent. Her eastern temperament lent itself to the growing mysticism of the rising church; her sufferings, under the fierce dispensations of pagan despotism, gave energy to her predilections; and her long seclusion from the busy haunts of life (while secretly directing the councils of her ambitious son), assisted her woman's sagacity in detecting the utter effeteness of the old state hierarchy, and in divining the efficiency of the newits closer adaptation to the peculiar temperaments of the races which were then overrunning the earth. All these circumstances, combining with her shrewd, astute, and deviceful disposition, may be believed at once to have mastered her convictions, and to have directed her after conduct."

MUSICAL TALENT OF THE COBURG FAMILY.-The ducal family of Saxe-Coburg possesses several distinguished musicians. Both Prince Albert and Prince Ernest are very efficient performers on the pianoforte, and the musical compositions of the former, even if produced by a humbler individual, would be admitted to contain much grace and sweetness. The Duchess of Kent is also a very excellent pianiste; and King Leopold is a superior performer on the violin; while the Princess Victoria, who is on the point of being united to the Duc de Nemours, possesses, like her cousin, "the Majesty of England," very considerable musical talents.