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distinguished living. A citation in the pearance and estimation. The mere schonotice of Grose* tells us that lar, the mere mathematician, and the mere antiquary, easily obtain reputations for eccentricity; but there are numerous individuals of profound abstraction, and erudite inquiry, who cultivate the understanding, or the imagination, or the heart, who are, in manner, so little different from the unknown and the self-sufficient of others, that they are scarcely suspected by being better or wiser than themselves. Hence, 66 in company," the individual whom all the world agrees to look on as "The Great Unknown," may be scarcely thought of, as "The Antiquary"-the "President of the Royal Society" pass "quite a lady's man"-and ELIA be only regarded as 66 a gentleman that loves a joke!"

"society droops for the loss of his jest:" that antiquary's facetiousness enlivened the dullest company, and with the convivial he was the most jovial. Pennant's numerous works bear internal evidence of his pleasant mindedness. Jacob Bryant, "famous for his extensive learning, erudition," and profound investigations concerning "Heathen Mythology," and the situation and siege of "Troy," was one of the mildest and most amiable beings: his society was coveted by youth and age, until the termination of his life, in his eighty-ninth year. Among the illustrious lovers of classic or black letter lore, were the witty and humorous George Steevens, the editor of Shakspeare; Dr. Richard Farmer, the learned author of the masterly" Essay on the Genius and Learning of Shakspeare," is renowned by the few who remember him for the ease and variety of his conversation; Samuel Paterson, the celebrated bibliopolist, was full of anecdote and drollery; and the placid and intelligent Isaac Reed, the discriminating editor of "the immortal bard of Avon," graced every circle wherein he moved. It might seem to assume an intimacy which the editor of this work does not pretend to, were he to mention instances of social excellence among the prying investigators of antiquity yet alive: one, however, he cannot forbear to namethe venerable octogenarian John Nichols, esq. F.S.A. of whom he only knows, in common with all who have read or heard of him, as an example of cheerfulness and amenity during a life of unwearied perseverance in antiquarian researches, and the formation of multiform collections, which have added more to general information, and created a greater number of inquirers on such subjects, than the united labours of his early contemporaries.

Still it is not to be denied, that seclusion, wholly employed on the foundations of the dead, and the manners of other times, has a tendency to unfit such devotees for easy converse, when they seek to recreate by adventuring into the world. Early-acquired and long-continued severity of study, whether of the learned languages, or antiquities, or science, or nature, if it exclude other intimacies, is unfavourable to personal ap

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NATURE AND ART.

"Buy my images!"

for

"Art improves nature," is an old proverb which our forefathers adopted without reflection, and obstinately adhered to as lovers of consistency. The capacity and meshes of their brain were too small to hold many great truths, but they caught a great number of little errors, and this was one. They bequeathed it to "their children and their children's children," who inherited it till they threw away the wisdom of their ancestors with their wigs; left off hair powder; and are now leaving off the sitting in hot club rooms, for the sake of sleep, and exercise in the fresh air. There seems to be a general insurrection against the unnatural improvement of nature. We let ourselves and our trees grow out of artificial forms, and no longer sit in artificial arbours, with entrances like that of the cavern at Blackheath hill, or, as we may even still see them, if we pay a last visit to the dying beds of a few old tea-gardens.

We

know more than those who lived before
us, and if we are not happier, we are on
the way to be so.
Wisdom is happiness:
but "he that increaseth knowledge, in-
creaseth sorrow." Knowledge is not wis-
dom; it is only the rough material of
wisdom. It must be shaped by reflection
and judgment, before it can be constructed
into an edifice fitting for the mind to
dwell in, and take up its rest. This, as
our old discoursers used to say, "brings
us to our subject.'

Buy my images!" or, "Pye m'imaitches," was, and is, a " London cry," by Italian lads carrying boards on their heads,

with plaster figures for sale. "In my time," one of these "images" (it usually occupied a corner of the board) was a "Polly"

A lengthened mass became by colourable show," a dog"-like ingenuity might have tortured it into a devil. The feline race were of two shapes and in three sizes; the middle one-like physic in a bottle, "when taken, to be well shaken," moved its chalk head, to the wonder and delight of all urchins, until they informed themselves of its "springs of action," at the price of " only a penny," and, by breaking it, discovered that the nodding knob achieved its un-cat-like motion, by being hung with a piece of wire to the interior of its hollow body. The lesser cat was not so very small, considering its price "a farthing:"-I speak of when battered button tops represented that plentiful "coin of the realm." Then there was the largest

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A Parrot.

This representative of the most "popular" of "all the winged inhabitants of air," might have been taken for the likeness of some species between an owl and the booby-bird; but then the wings and back were coloured with a lively green, and the under part had yellow streaks, and the beak was of a red colour, and any colour did for the eyes, if they were larger than they ought to have been. "In my time" too, there was an "image" of a "fine bow pot," consisting of half a dozen green shapes like halbert tops for "make believe" leaves, spreading like a half opened fan, from a knot " that was not," inasmuch as it was delicately concealed by a tawny coloured ball called an orange, which pretended to rest on clumsy clump of yellowed plaster as on the mouth of a jar-the whole looking as unlike a nosegay in water as possible. Then, too, there was a sort of obelisk with irregular projections and curves; the top, being smaller than the bottom, was marked out with paint into a sort of face, and, by the device of divers colours, it was bonnetted, armed, waisted, and petticoated-this was called a "fine lady."

a

Cat.

The present representation favours the image too much. Neither this engraving, nor that of the " parrot," is sufficiently like-the artist says he "could not draw it bad enough:" what an abominable deficiency is the want of "an eye"-heigho! Then there were so many things, that were not likenesses of any thing of which they were images," and so many years and cares have rolled over my head and heart, that I have not recollection or time enough for their description. They are all gone, or going-" going out" or "gone out for ever! Personal remembrance is the

66

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frail and only memorial of the existence of some of these "ornaments" of the humble abodes of former times.

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through the operation of time.
"Such were the forms that o'er th' incrusted
souls

Of our forefathers scatter'd fond delight.”

The masterpieces on the board of the "image-man, were "a pair,"-at that Price, and Alison, and Knight, have time matchless." They linger yet, at generalized "taste" for high-life; while the extreme corners of a few mantle- those of the larger circle have acquired pieces, with probably a "taste sampler" be" from manifold representations tween, and, over that, a couple of feathers and vehicles of instruction, and comprefrom Juno's bird, gracefully adjusted hend the outlines, if they do not take in into a St. Andrew's cross-their two gor- the details of natural objects. This is geous eyes giving out "beautiful colours," manifested by the almost universal disuse to the beautiful eyes of innocent children. of the "images" described. With the The" images," spoken of as still in being, inhabitants of every district in the meare of the colossal height of eighteen tropolis, agreeable forms are now absoinches, more or less: they personate the lute requisites, and the demand has in"human form divine," and were designed, duced their supply. There are, perhaps, perhaps, by Hayman, but their moulds as many casts from the Medicean Venus, are so worn that the casts are unfeatured, Apollo Belvidere, Antinous, the Gladiaand they barely retain their bodily sem- tor, and other beauties of ancient sculpture, blance. They are always painted black, within the parish of St. George, in the save that a scroll on each, which depends East, as in the parish of St. George, Hanfrom a kind of altar, is left white. One over-square. They are reposited over the of the inscriptions says, fire-places, or on the tables, of neighbourhoods, wherein the uncouth cat, and the barbarous parrot were, even "in my time," desirable images." The moulds of the greater number of these deformities, are probably destroyed. It was with difficulty that the "cat" could be obtained for the preceding column, and an "image" of the "parrot" was not procurable from an "image-man." Invention has been resorted to for the gratification of popular desire: two plaster casts of children, published in the autumn of 1825, have met with unparalleled sale. To record the period of their origin they are represented in the annexed engraving, and, perhaps, they may be so perpetuated is an "insubstantial pageant" of "the when the casts themselves shall have disimmortal Shakspeare,"

“Into the heaven of heavens I have pre

sumed, &c."

and all, except the owners, admire the presumption. The "effigy" looks as if the man had been up the chimney, and, instead of having" drawn empyrean air," had taken a glass too much of Hodges's "Imperial," and wrapped himself in the soot-bag to conceal his indulgence and his person-this is "Milton." The other, in like sables, points to his inscription, beginning,

"The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous palaces, &c."

appeared, in favour of others more ele

"cheated of feature by dissembling nature," gant.

The "common people" have become uncommon;
A few remain, just here and there, the rest
Are polish'd and refined: child, man, and woman,
All, imitate the manners of the best;

Picking up, sometimes, good things from their betters,

As they have done from them. Then they have books;
As 'twas design'd they should, when taught their letters;
And nature's self befriends their very looks:

And all this must, and all this ought to be-
The only use of eyes, I know of, is-to see.

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316

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When these agreeable figures first appeared, the price obtained for them was four shillings. As the sale slackened they were sold for three shillings; now, in March, 1826, the pair may be bought for two shillings, or eighteen pence. The consequence of this cheapness is, that there is scarcely a house without them.

scarcely trust the human voice can itself to relate; which art never can represent, and the pen can only feebly describe. Such a scene occurred at Lyons, in the year 1794.

The place of confinement to which those were hurried, who had been condemned to suffer by the revolutionary tribunal, was called "the Cave of Death." A boy not fifThere can be no doubt that society teen years of age was sent thither. He had As I been one of the foremost in a sortie made is improving in every direction. hinted before, we have a great deal to during the siege, and for this was doomed to perish. His little brother, scarcely six learn, and something to unlearn. It is in many respects untrue, that " art improves years old, who had been accustomed to nature;" while in many important respects visit him at his former prison, no longer finding him there, came and called at the it is certain, that "nature improves art." iron grate of the vault. His brother heard him, and came to the grate: the poor infant passed his little hands between There are things in nature which the vast bars to embrace him, while the

The Brothers.

elder raising himself on the points of his feet could just reach to kiss them. "My dear brother," said the child, "art thou going to die, and shall I see thee no more? why didn't you tell them that you are not yet fifteen?"-"I did, brother, I said all that I could say, but they would hear nothing. Carry a kiss to my mother, and try to comfort her; nothing grieves me but that I leave her ill; but don't tell her yet, that I am going to die." The child was drowned in tears, his little

heart seemed ready to burst:-"Goodby, brother," he repeated again and again; "but I'm afraid you didn't say that you are not yet fifteen."-He was at length so suffocated with sobs that he could speak no more, and went away. Every one who passed by, seeing his distress, asked him what was the matter. ""Tis the wicked men that make me cry," said he; "they are going to kill my brother who is so good, and who is not yet fifteen."

With any being of a human form,
Who, reading such a narrative as this
Could be unshaken to the inmost soul,

I would not share a roof, nor sit, nor stand,

Nor converse hold, by word, or look, or pen.

Well, Reader! thou hast read-hast thou no tears?
If thou wert stranger to the tale till now,

And weep'st not-go! I dare not, will not, know thee
Thy manner may be gentle, but thy heart
Is ripe for cruelty-Go hence, I say!

March 7.

The Season.

The earth has now several productions for our gratification, if we stoop to gather and examine them. Young botanists should commence their inquiries before

the season pours in its abundance. They who are admirers of natural beauties, may daily discover objects of delightful regard in the little peeping plants which escape the eye, unless their first appearance is narrowly looked for.

The Primrose.

Welcome, pale Primrose! starting up between
Dead matted leaves of ash and oak, that strew
The every lawn, the wood, and spinney through,
'Mid creeping moss and ivy's darker green;

How much thy presence beautifies the ground:
How sweet thy modest, unaffected pride
Glows on the sunny bank, and wood's warm side.
And when thy fairy flowers, in groups, are found,
The schoolboy roams enchantedly along,

Plucking the fairest with a rude delight:
While the meek shepherd stops his simple song,
To gaze a moment on the pleasing sight;
O'erjoy'd to see the flowers that truly bring
The welcome news of sweet returning spring!

It is remarked by the lady of the "Flora Domestica," that "this little flower, in itself so fair, shows yet fairer from the early season of its appearance; peeping forth even from the retreating snows of winter: it forms a happy shade of union between the delicate snowdrop and the flaming crocus, which also venture forth in the very dawn of spring." The elegant authoress observes further: "There are many varieties of the prim

Clare.

rose, so called, (the polyanthus and auricular, though bearing other names, are likewise varieties,) but the most common are the sulphur-coloured and the lilac. The lilac primrose does not equal the other in beauty: we do not often find it wild; it is chiefly known to us as a garden-flower. It is indeed the sulphurcoloured primrose which we particularly understand by that name: it is the primrose: it is this which we associate with

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