labourers who may be near, and after a chat takes a nap on his spread cumley or jota for half an hour, while his wife eats what he has left. He yokes his cattle again about two or half-past two o'clock, and works till sunset, when he proceeds leisurely home, ties up and feeds his oxen, then goes himself to a brook, bathes and washes, or has hot water thrown over him by his wife at home. After his ablutions, and perhaps on holidays anointing himself with sandal wood oil, he prays before his household gods, and often visits one or more of the village temples. His wife by this time has prepared his supper, which he takes in company with the males of the family. His principal enjoyment seems to be between this meal and bed-time, which is nine or ten o'clock. He now fondles and plays with his children, visits or is visited by his neighbours, and converses about the labour of the day and concerns of the village, either in the open air or by the glimmering light of a lamp, learns from the shopkeeper or beadle what strangers have passed or stopped at the village, and their history, and from any of the community that may have been at the city (Poohnah) what news he has brought. In the less busy times, which are two or three months in the year, the cultivators take their meals at home, and have sufficient leisure for amusement. They then sit in groups in the shade and converse, visit their friends in the neighbouring villages, go on pilgrimages, &c. &c. The women of the cultivators, like those of other Asiatics, are seldom the subject of gallantry, and are looked on rather as a part of their live stock than as companions, and yet, contrary to what might be expect. ed, their condition seems far from being unhappy. The law allows a husband to beat his wife, and for infidelity to maim her or else put her to death; but these severities are seldom resorted to, and rarely any sort of harsh behaviour. A man is despised who is seen much in company with women. A wife, therefore, never looks for any fondling from her husband; it is thought unbecoming in him even to mention her name, and she is never allowed to eat in company with him, from the time of their wedding dinner; but patiently waits on him during his meals, and makes her repast on what he leaves. But setting aside these marks of contempt, she is always treated with kindness and forbearance, unless her conduct is very perverse and bad, and she has her entire liberty. The women have generally the sole direction of household affairs, and if clever, notwithstanding all their disad

vantages, not unfrequently gain as great an ascendancy over their lords as in other parts of the world.*

ROUND ROBIN.

It was customary among the ancients to write names, whether of the gods, or of their friends, in a circle, that none might take offence at seeing another's name preferred to his own. The Cordeliers have formerly been known to have paid the same attention to delicacy, and when a pope has demanded the names of some priests of their order, that one might be raised to the purple, they have sent those names written circularly, that they might not seem to recommend one more than another. The race of sailors are the only people who preserve this very ancient custom in its purity, for when any remonstrance is on foot among them, they sign it in a circle, and call it a round robin.

NAMES.

Toward the middle of the fifteenth century, it was the fancy of the wits and learned men of the age, particularly in Italy, to change their baptismal names for classical ones. As Sannazarius, for instance, who altered his own plain name "Jacopo to "Actius Syncerus." Numbers did the same, and among the rest, Platina the historian, at Rome, who, not without a solemn ceremonial, took the name of "Callimachus," instead of " Philip." Pope Paul II., who reigned about that time, unluckily chanced to be suspicious, illiterate, and heavy of comprehension. He had no idea that persons could wish to alter their names, unless they had some bad design, and actually scrupled not to employ imprisonment, and other violent methods, to discover the fancied mystery. Platina was mostcruelly tortured on this frivolous account; he had nothing to confess, so the pope, after endeavouring in vain to convict him of heresy, sedition, &c. released him, after a long imprisonment.

named Devil. In an old book, the title of Formerly there were many persons surwhich does not recur, mention is made of one Rogerius Diabolus, lord of Mon

tresor.

* Mr. Coates in Trans. Bombay Lit. Soc.

On our way from Penge, W. thought this object worth sketching. He occupied himself with his pencil, and I amused myself with dropping grains of dust among a fleet of tadpoles on the yellow sands, and watching their motions: a few inches from them, in a clearer shallow, lay a shoal of stickle-backs as on their Dogger-bank: a thread and a blood-worm, and the absence of my friend, and of certain feelings in behalf of the worms, would have afforded me excellent sport. The rivulet crosses the road from a meadow, where I heard it in its narrow channel, and muttering inwardly

"the rapids are near," from the "Canadian Boat-song," I fell into a reverie on Wilson's magnificent painting of the falls of Niagara, in Mr. Landseer's paintingroom. While I seated myself by the wayside, and, among ground-ivy and periwinkle, discriminating the diminutive forms of trees in the varied mosses of an old bank, I recollected descriptions I had read of transatlantic scenery, and the gigantic vegetation on the Ohio and Mississipi.

A labourer told us, that this little brook is called "Chaffinch's River," and that it springs from "the Alders," near Croydon, and runs into the Ravensbourne.

Garrick Plays.

No. XX.

[From "Bussy D'Ambois his Revenge," a Tragedy, by George Chapman, 1613.]

Plays and Players.

Guise. I would have these things Brought upon Stages, to let mighty Misers

See all their grave and serious mischiefs play'd,

As once they were in Athens and old Rome.

Were only maskeries, and wore false faces,
Or else were simply vain, I take no care;
But still he laugh'd, how grave soe'er they were.

Stoicism.

in this one thing all the discipline

Of manners and of manhood is contain'd;
A Man to join himself with the Universe

In his main sway; and make (in all things fit)
One with that All; and go on, round as it:
Not plucking froin the whole his wretched part,
And into straits, or into nought revert;

on Stages

But puppetry, and pied ridiculous antics.
Men thither come to laugh, and feed fool-fat ;
Check at all goodness there, as being profaned:
When, wheresoever Goodness comes, she makes
The place still sacred, though with other feet
Never so much 'tis scandal'd and polluted.
Let me learn any thing, that fits a man,

In

any Stables shewn, as well as Stages.-
Baligny. Why, is not all the World esteem'd a Stage?
Clermont. Yes, and right worthily; and Stages too
Have a respect due to them, if but only

For what the good Greek Moralist says of them:
"Is a man proud of greatness, or of riches?
Give me an expert Actor; I'll shew all
That can within his greatest glory fall:

Is a man 'fraid with poverty and lowness?
Give me an Actor; I'll shew every eye
What he laments so, and so much does fly :
The best and worst of both."-If but for this then,
To make the proudest outside, that most swells
With things without him, and above his worth,
See how small cause he has to be so blown up;
And the most poor man, to be griev'd with poorness;
Both being so easily borne by expert Actors:
The Stage and Actors are not so contemptful,
As every innovating Puritan,

And ignorant Swearer out of jealous envy,
Would have the world imagine. And besides
That all things have been liken'd to the mirth
Used upon Stages, and to Stages fitted;
The Splenetive Philosopher, that ever
Laugh'd at them all, were worthy the enstaging:
All objects, were they ne'er so full of tears,
He so conceited, that he could distill thence
Matter, that still fed his ridiculous humour.
Heard he a Lawyer, never so vehement pleading,

He stood and laugh'd. Heard he a Tradesman, swear

ing

Never so thriftily, selling of his wares,

He stood and laugh'd. Heard he a Holy Brother,
For hollow ostentation, at his prayers
Ne'er so impetuously, he stood and laugh'd.
Saw he a Great Man, never so insulting,
Severely inflicting, gravely giving laws,

Not for their good but his-he stood and laugh'd.
Saw he a Youthful Widow,

Never so weeping, wringing of her hands

For her dead Lord, still the Philosopher laugh'd.Now, whether he supposed all these Presentments

Subject to such a rag of it as He.

Apparitions before the Body's Death: SCOTICE, Second Sight.

these true Shadows of the Guise and Cardinal,
Fore-running thus their Bodies, may approve,
That all things to be done, as here we live,
Are done before all times in th' other life.

[From "Satiromastix," a Comedy, by Thomas Decker, 1602: in which Ben Jonson, under the name of Horace, is reprehended, in retaliation of his "Poetaster;" in which he had attacked two of his Brother Dramatists, probably Marston and Decker, under the names of Crispinus and Demetrius.]

Horace. What could I do, out of a just revenge,
But bring them to the Stage? they envy me,
Because I hold more worthy, company.
Demetrius. Good Horace, no; my cheeks do blush
for thine,

As often as thou speaks't so. Where one true
And nobly-virtuous spirit for thy best part
Loves thee, I wish one ten even from my heart.
I make account I put up as deep share
In any good man's love, which thy worth owns,
As thou thyself; we envy not to see
Thy friends with bays to crown thy Poesy.
No, here the gall lies; we that know what stuff
Thy very heart is made of, know the stalk
On which thy learning grows, and can give life
To thy (once dying) baseness, yet must we
Dance antics on thy paper,

Crispinus. This makes us angry, but not envious.
No; were thy warpt soul put in a new mould,
I'd wear thee as a jewel set in gold.

[From the "Antipodes," a Comedy, by Richard Brome, 1633.]

Directions to Players.

Nobleman. My actors

Are all in readiness, and I think all perfect, But one, that never will be perfect in a thing

He studies; yet he makes such shifts extempore,
(Knowing the purpose what he is to speak to),
That he moves mirth in me 'bove all the rest.
For I am none of those Poetic Furies,

That threats the actor's life, in a whole Play
That adds a syllable, or takes away.

If he can fribble through, and move delight
In others, I am pleased.-

Let me not see you now,

In the scholastic way you brought to town with you,
With see-saw sack-a-down, like a sawyer;
Nor in a comic scene play Hercules Furens,
Tearing your throat to split the audients' ears;-
And you, Sir, you had got a trick of late
Of holding out your breech in a set speech;
Your fingers fibulating on your breast,
As if your buttons or your bandstrings were
Helps to your memory; let me see you in't
No more, I charge you. No, nor you, Sir,
In that o'er-action of your legs I told you of,
Your singles and doubles-look you—thus-
your
Like one of the dancing-masters of the bear-garden;
And when you've spoke, at end of every speech,
Not minding the reply, you turn you round
As tumblers do, when betwixt every feat
They gather wind by firking up their breeches.
I'll none of these absurdities in my house;
But words and actions married so together,
That shall strike harmony in the ears and eyes
Of the severest, if judicious, eritics.

Players. My Lord, we are corrected.
Nobleman. Go, be ready.-

But you, Sir, are incorrigible, and
Take licence to yourself to add unto

Your parts your own free fancy; and sometimes
To alter or diminish what the writer

With care and skill composed; and when you are
To speak to your Co-actors in the scene,
You hold interloqutions with the audients.

Player. That is a way, my Lord, has been allowed
On elder stages, to move mirth and laughter.
Nobleman. Yes, in the days of Tarleton and Kemp,
Before the Stage was purged from barbarism,
And brought to the perfection it now shines with.
Then Fools and Jesters spent their wits, because
The Poets were wise enough to save their own
For profitabler uses.-

some notice of this extraordinary man may not be uninteresting.

The authenticity of this account depends entirely on the authority of Kircher. He assures us, he had it from the archives of the kings of Sicily; but its having so much of the marvellous in it, many have been disposed to doubt its accuracy. Historians are too fond of fiction, but we should by no means doubt their sincerity, when we find them on other subjects not contempti ble authorities.

"In the time of Frederic, king of Sicily, (says Kircher,) there lived a celebrated diver, whose name was Nicholas, and who, from his amazing skill in swimming, and his perseverance under the water, was surnamed the fish. This man had from his infancy been used to the sea; and earned his scanty subsistence by diving for corals and oysters, which he sold to the villagers on shore. His long acquaintance with the sea at last brought it to be almost his natural element. He was frequently known to spend five days in the midst of the waves, without any other provisions than the fish which he caught there, and ate raw. He often swam over from Sicily into Cala→ bria, a tempestuous and dangerous passage, carrying letters from the king. He was frequently known to swim among the gulfs of Lipari, no way apprehensive of danger.

"Some mariners out at sea one day observing something at a distance from them, regarded it as a sea-monster; but upon its approach it was known to be Nicholas, whom they took into their ship. When they asked him whither he was going in so stormy and rough a sea, and at such a distance from land, he showed them a packet of letters, which he was carrying to one of the towns of Italy, exactly done up in a leather bag, in such a manner that He they could not be wetted by the sea. kept them company for some time in their voyage, conversing and asking questions; and, after eating with them, took his leave, and jumping into the sea, pursued his voyage alone.

"In order to aid these powers of enduring in the deep, nature seemed to have assisted him in a very extraordinary manner; for the spaces between his fingers and toes were webbed as in a goose: and his chest became so very capacious, that he was able, at one inspiration, to take in as much breath as would serve him a whole day.

"The account of so extraordinary a person did not fail to reach the king himself;