three full hours, that I could repeat, and have repeated after wards, in different companies, without the loss of a single sentence. I have, in telling such, done little else than give a verbal relation, only mending the language, where it appeared particularly faulty." But were those tales, to which you refer, told in verse? "No; they were all in prose: but they might have been originally in verse; for the persons who related them, translated them out of their maternal tongue, which was Irish, alias Gaelic. I asked no questions relative to the form in which they existed in the original; because I did not know that any thing depended on it; for of Macpherson and his Ossian, and the controversy on that subject, no man had then heard."

In one of those tales which relates to Fion ma cool, (Fingal,) there is a statement of his conversion by the preaching of St. Patrick. When the chief of Erin presented himself before the Saint, he found him very decrepit, and obliged to support himself on two crutches, while he performed the ceremony of baptism. When about to sprinkle the water upon Fingal's head, the Saint was obliged to shift his ground, in order to stand more commodiously by the chief. In doing this he unwittingly placed the pike of his crutch upon Fion's foot: the ceremony being ended, when St. Patrick was about to move away, he found the end of his crutch entangled in the foot of the chief, the pike having run through it and pinned it to the ground! Expressing both his surprise and regret, he asked Fingal, "Why he had not informed him of the mistake at first?" the noble chief answered, “I thought, holy father, that this had been a part of the ceremony." He who could have acted so must have been truly magnanimous, and sincerely desirous of becoming a Christían!

When work and tales were ended the supper was introduced, which was invariably in the winter evenings, a basket of potatoes, boiled, without being peeled; and either a salt herring, or a little milk, mostly butter-milk. Immediately after this simple repast all went to bed, and generally arose to work a considerable time before day.

In few parts of the world do the peasantry live a more industrious and harmless life. It should also be stated, that sometimes, instead of tales, they employ themselves with riddles, puzzles, and various trials of wit. Sometimes in narrative and national songs, among which are accounts of foreign travels, shipwrecks, the Battle of the Boyne, and the Siege of Londonderry. They are fond also of blazoning the piety, fortitude, noble descent, and valorous achievements of their forefathers. Feats, requiring either much strength or agility, were frequent exercises for their young men in these social meetings; such as lifting weights; and, in moonlight nights, out of doors, putting the stone, and pitching the bar or iron

crow. Balancing was a favorite amusement, but in this very few make much proficiency, because it requires great agility and a very steady eye. Perhaps, few ever carried this to greater perfection than young Clarke; whatever he was able to lift on his chin, that he could balance: iron crows, sledge hammers, ladders, chairs, &c. &c., he could in a great variety of combinations balance to great perfection on chin, nose and forehead. In short, whatever he saw done in this way he could do; so that many of the common people thought he performed these feats by a supernatural agency. How much more rational and manly are such amusements than cards, dice, or degrading games of hazard of any kind! By these, the mind is debased, and the meanest and vilest passions excited, nourished and gratified. By those, emulation, corporeal strength, agility, &c. are produced and maintained. The former may make poltroons and assassins, but can never make a man, a friend, or a hero.

Of his Religious Education, scarcely any thing has been yet spoken; as it was not judged proper to mix his boyish operations and pursuits with matters of a more severe and spiritual cast.

We have already seen that, at a very early age his mind was deeply impressed with subjects of the greatest importance. This was not a transitory impression:-his mother was a woman decidedly religious: she was a Presbyterian of the old Puritanic school. She had been well catechised in her youth, and had read the Scriptures with great care and to much profit. She ever placed the fear of God before the eyes of her children, caused them to read and reverence the Scriptures, and endeavoured to impress the most interesting parts on their minds. If they did wrong at any time, she had recourse uniformly to the Bible, to strengthen her reproofs and to deepen conviction. In these she was so conversant and ready, that there was scarcely a delinquency, for the condemnation of which she could not easily find a portion. She seemed to find them on the first opening, and would generally say, "See what God has guided my eye to in a moment." Her own reproofs her children could in some measure bear; but when she had recourse to the Bible, they were terrified out of measure; such an awful sense had they of the truth of God's Word and the Majesty of the Author. One anecdote will serve to shew her manner of reproving, and the impression made by such reproofs.

Adam one day disobeyed his mother, and the disobedience was accompanied with some look or gesture that indicated an undervaluing of her authority. This was a high affront; she

immediately flew to the Bible, and opened on these words, Prov. xxx. 17, which she read and commented on in a most awful manner:-"The eye that mocketh at his father, and despiseth to obey his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and the young eagles shall eat it." The poor culprit was cut to the heart, believing the words had been sent immediately from heaven: he went out into the field with a troubled spirit, and was musing on this horrible denunciation of Divine displeasure, when the hoarse croak of a raven sounded to his conscience an alarm more terrible than the cry of fire at midnight! He looked up and soon perceived this most ominous bird, and actually supposing it to be the raven of which the text spoke, coming to pick out his eyes, he clapped his hands on them with the utmost speed and trepidation, and ran towards the house as fast as the state of his alarm and perturbation would admit, that he might escape the impending vengeance!

The severe creed of his mother led her more frequently to represent the Supreme Being as a God of justice, than as the God of mercy: the consequence was, the children dreaded God, and obeyed only through fear:-perhaps, this was the only impression that could be made, to awaken conscience and keep it awake.

66

To the religious instructions of his mother, her son ever attributed, under God, that fear of the Divine Majesty, which ever prevented him from taking pleasure in sin. 'My mother's reproofs and terrors never left me," said he, "till I sought and found the salvation of God. And sin was generally so burthensome to me, that I was glad to hear of deliverance from it. She taught me such reverence for the Bible, that if I had it in my hand even for the purpose of studying a chapter in order to say it as a lesson, and had been disposed with my class-fellows to sing, whistle a tune, or be facetious, I dared not do either while the book was open in my hands. In such cases I always shut it and laid it down beside me. Who will dare to lay this to the charge of superstition!”

We need not say that such a mother taught her children to pray. Each night, before they went to bed, they regularly kneeled successively at her knee and said the Lord's Prayer; and implored a blessing on father, mother, relatives, and friends those who were six years old and upwards, said also the Apostles' Creed. She had also a Morning Prayer and an Evening Prayer, which she taught them: these prayers were in verse; who was the author we know not. As they are simple and expressive, and well suited to infant minds, I shall insert them for their piety, whatever may be thought of their poetry.

AN EVENING PRAYER, FOR A YOUNG CHILD.

"I go

to my bed as to my grave,
And pray to God my life to save.
But if I die, before I wake,

I pray to God my soul to take.
Sweet Jesus now, to thee I cry,
To grant me mercy before I die!

To grant me mercy, and send me grace,
That heaven may be my dwelling place!"

A MORNING PRAYER, FOR A YOUNG CHILD.
"Preserve me, Lord, amidst the crowd,
From every thought that's vain and proud;
And raise my wandering mind to see,
How good it is to trust in THEE!
From all the enemies of thy truth,
Do thou, O Lord, preserve my youth:
And raise my mind from worldly cares,
From youthful sins and youthful snares!
Lord, tho' my heart's as hard as stone,
Let seeds of early grace be sown;
Still watered by thy heavenly love,
Till they spring up to joys above!"

These she caused them to conclude with the following short doxology.

"Give to the FATHER praise,

And glory to the SON;

And to the SPIRIT of his grace

Be equal honour done!"

The xxiiird Psalm in the old Version she also taught them to repeat, and her two sons she caused to learn and repeat Psalm cxxviii.

For the little Prayers above mentioned, Adam ever felt a fond attachment. "They contain," said he, "the first breathings of my mind towards God; and even many years after I had known the power of God to my Salvation, I continued to repeat them, as long as I could with propriety use the term youth."

Every Lord's Day was strictly sanctified; no manner of work was done in the family: and the children were taught from their earliest youth to sanctify the Sabbath. On that day she took the opportunity to catechise and instruct her children, would read a chapter, sing a portion of a Psalm, and then go to prayer. While reading, she always accustomed the children who had discernment, to note some particular verse in the reading, and repeat it to her when prayer was over. This engaged all their attention, and was the means of impressing the word on their hearts as well as on their memories. She obliged

them also to get by heart the Church Catechism, and the Shorter Catechism of the Assembly of Divines.

Thus, the children had the creed of their father, who was a Churchman, and the creed of their mother, who was a Presbyterian; though she was far from being a Calvinist. But, although they went occasionally to the Presbyterian meeting, they all felt a decided preference for the Church.

Though the parents of A. C. belonged to different Christian communities, they never had any animosities on religious subjects. The parish clergyman and the Presbyterian parson, were equally welcome to the house; and the husband and wife most cheerfully permitted each other to go on their own way: nor were any means used by either to determine their children to prefer one community to the other. They were taught to fear God and expect Redemption through the Blood of the Cross, and all other matters were considered by their parents, of comparatively little moment.

As it was fashionable as well as decent for all those who attended divine worship on the Lord's Day to take a part in the public singing, (for choirs of singers, the bane of this part of religious worship, were not known in those times,) so the youth spent a part of the long winter's evenings in learning what was called sacred music. A person less or more skilled in this art, set up a night school in some of the most populous villages; and the young people attended him for two or three hours, so many nights in the week. All had books in which the same tunes were pricked; and each tune was at first sol fa'd, till it was tolerably well learned, and then sung to some corresponding words. Afterwards, each was obliged to give out some verse of his own; and lastly, as trials of skill, one made a line; by the time that was sung, another was obliged to find a line that would match in measure and meaning, a third did the same, and a fourth in the same way concluded the stanza; neither of these knowing any thing previously of the subject on which he should be obliged to compose his verse: these trials of skill often produced much doggerel, but there were, not unfrequently, some happy lines and flashes of real wit. Sometimes this contest lay between two persons, the second of whom had no more than the time in which the previous line was sung, to make that which was to be its correspondent, both in sense and measure.

This method of singing and making alternate verses, is certainly very ancient; we may find traces of it among the ancient Greeks and Romans: and in Homer, Theocritus, and Virgil, it is expressly mentioned. The song of Moses, of Deborah and Barak, and the fifth chapter of Isaiah, and other portions in the Old Testament, seem to have been composed in the same way. Homer, Theocritus, and Virgil, are direct proofs. A quotation from each will shew that this humble singing of