Welsh Raggedness. "SCHYR MAWRICE, alsua the Berclay Fra the gret bataill held hys way, With a gret rout of Walis men, nations they subjugated, with great success as long as sun-worship held good. But at length they came to a people who, situated on a rocky coast in a sultry climate, could not in conscience submit to adore a being Quhareuir thai yeid men mycht thaim ken. almost insupportable, and consequently odi For thai wele ner all nakyt war, Or lynnyn clathys had but mar." ous to them; and durst propose to their conquerors to quit their irrational idolatry, and to worship with themselves their mother and goddess the sea, the inexhausted giver of good things."-Letter from North America, in a Pocket of Prose and Verse, being a Selection from the Literary Productions of ALEXANDER KELLET. Men Ornamented, not Women. "A YOUNG man among the Indians is dressed with visible attention; a warrior is a furious beau, and a woman, the Asiatic, the European, the African Doll, is with them a neglected squat animal, whose hair is stroked over those glistening eyes it dares not uplift, and who seldom uses its aspen tongue, and when it does, is scarcely loud enough to be heard. When we reproach the Indians on this account, they point to their animated woods, and tell us that they see not whence we have picked up a contrary practice; but that they themselves 1 "After answering many of the lady's questions, he looked into the yard through the win. dow very earnestly, where an aspen tree grew. The lady asked him, ' What he was looking at so earnestly?" He asked her, 'What tree she called that in the yard?" She said, 'It was a quaking asp.' He replied in broken English, 'Indian no call him quake asp.'' What then?' asked the inquisitive hostess. 'Woman tongue, Woman tongue,' answered the sagacious warrior, never still, never still, always go."". HUNTER'S Memoirs of his Captivity among the North American Indians, p. 376. I mentioned this soon after the publication of Hunter's book to a Welsh friend, who told me that the aspen poplar bore the same name among the Cymry," Tafod y Merchen," or Woman's Tongue. This was on the Conway, and I noted it down at the time; but I do not find it in Richard's Welsh Dictionary."-J. W. W. have learnt their lesson from whatever | carry to his nation an account, that he had moves around them, from the birds and the met with a tribe who could hunt men better beasts, whose males are lavishly adorned in than his own."—Ibid. denudation of their females, from the gay plumage of the turky cock, and the ornament-loaded head of the stag.”—Kellet. The Plaint of an Old Indian.1 He observes," that in the happy days of youth, he was loved or feared by all; that he could tomahawk his enemy and could not miss his game; that every river was then an inn to him, and every squah he met a wife; but that now he was grown old, every one hated and scorned him; the deer bounded away from his erring aim, and the girls covered themselves repulsively at his approach; nor was he any longer permitted to paint and grace the glorious file of war:" and he concludes with ardent wishes, "that either nature had never disclosed him, or had gifted him with that power of renovation which seemed so improperly granted to the pernicious snake."-Ibid. Two Tribes Fighting. "SOME Warriors of two tribes of American savages met accidently on the banks of a river, and found they were strangers to one another. One of the parties demands of the other, who they were and what about, and receives in answer their name, and that they were hunting of beavers; and being challenged in their turn, answered, that their name was immaterial, but that their business was to hunt men. We are men, was the immediate reply, go no further. They then put off by agreement to a small island in the river, destroyed their canoes on both sides, and fought till only a few of the beaver hunters remained alive, and but one of the man hunters, who was spared to From this I suspect originated,-" The Old Teraphim. Henry the Second stript when Dead. "1189. IMMEDIATELY upon his death, those that were about him applied their market so busilie in catching and filching awaie things that laie readie for them, that the King's corps laie naked a long time, till a child covered the nether parts of his body with a short cloke, and then it seemed that his surname was fulfilled that he had from his childhood, which was Shortmantell, being so called, because he was the first who brought short clokes out of Anjou into England. Ibid. His Epitaph. To the epitaph of Henry II. these concluding lines are in Holinshed, p. 27 : "Quod potes instanter operare bonum, quià mundus Transit, et incautos mors inopina rapit." To the other couplet this is affixed: "Tumuli regis superscriptio brevis exornat." Both are thus translated, "Of late King Henrie was my name, which conquerd manie a land, And diverse dukedoms did possesse, and earledoms held in hand. And yet while all the earth could scarse my greedie mind suffice, Eight foot within the ground now serves, wherein my carcase lies. Now thou that readest this, note well of all that yeeldeth breath. Doo good then here, foreslowe no time, cast off all worldlie cares, For brittle world full soone dooth faile, and death dooth strike unwares." Another. "Small epitaph now serves to decke this toome of statelie king: And he who whilome thought whole earth could scarse his mind content, In little roome hath roome at large that serves now life is spent." The Lady Breuse. "WE read in an old historie of Flanders, written by one whose name is not knowne, but printed at Lions by Guillaume Rouille, 1562, that the Lady, wife to the Lord William de Breuse, presented upon a time unto the Queene of England a gift of four hundred kine and one bull, of colour all white, the eares excepted, which were red. Although this tale may seem incredible, yet if we shall consider that the said Breuse was a Lord Marcher, and had goodlie possessions in Wales and on the marshes, in which countries the most part of the peoples substance consisteth in cattell, it may carrie with it the more likelihood of truth. Touching the death of the said ladie, he saith, that within eleven daies after she was committed to prison heere in England, in the castell of Windsor, she was found dead, sitting betwixt her sons legs, who likewise being dead, sate directlie up against a wall of the chamber, wherein they were kept with hard pitance. As the fame went they were famished to death. William de Breuse himself escaped into France. A. D. 1210.1"Ibid. Welsh Monk Hatred. "THE first abbeie or frierie that is read to have beene erected there (in Wales) since the dissolution of the noble house of Bangor, which savoured not of Romish dregs, was the Twy Gwyn, which was builded in the yeare 1146. Afterwards these vermine swarmed like bees, or rather crawled like lice over all the land, and drew in with them their lowsie religion, tempered with I wot not how manie millions of abominations; having utterlie forgotten the lesson which Ambrosius Telesinus (Qy. Taliessin?) had taught them (who writ in the yeare 540, when the right Christian faith (which Joseph of Arimathea taught the ile of Avalon) reigned in this land, before the proud and bloodthirstie monke Augustine infected it with the poison of Romish errors) in a certeine ode, a part whereof are these few verses insuing. "Gwae'r offeiriad byd, Ac nys areilia: Gwae my theidw ey dheuaid, This story more properly attaches to Bramber Castle.-J. W. W. Thus in English, almost word for word, Grand Sergeanty Tenure of Brienston. "BRIENSTON, in Dorsetshire, was held in Grand Sergeanty by a pretty odd jocular tenure; viz. by finding a man to go before the Kings army for forty days when he should make war in Scotland (some records say in Wales), bareheaded and barefooted, in his shirt and linnen drawers, holding in one hand a bow without a string, in the other an arrow without feathers."-GIBSON's Camden. This may be alluded to in Madoc.2 Arabian Animals. "In the places where we generally rested are found the jerboa, the tortoise, the lizard, and some serpents, but not in great number. There is also an immense quantity of snails attached to the thorny plants on which the camels feed. Near the few springs of water are found wild rabbits, and the track of the antelope and the ostrich are frequently discoverable."-BROWNE's Travels in Africa, Egypt, and Syria. Misjed. "WE dismounted and seated ourselves, as is usual for strangers in this country, on a misjed, or place used for prayer, adjoining 2 See "Madoc in Wales," B. II. - Poems, p. 317.-J. W. W. untur. Trajicitur tamen, miro ingenio et Indorum proprio; ponte prorsus junceo ipsi aquæ commisso, nullis fulcris nixo, sed in modum suberis ponte supernatante, ac præ levitate materiæ nunquam merso; est vero trajectio facillima et tutissima. Occupat lacus ipse circuitum bis mille quadringenta stadia; longus est ferè nongenta, latus ubi maximè ducenta et viginti. Insulas habet olim habitatas et fertiles, nunc desertas, producit uberrimè junci genus, quod indigenæ Totoram vocant, cujus plurimus ipsis usus est; nam et cibus est suibus, jumentis, ipsisq; hominibus perjucundus, et domus et focus et vestis et navigium, et omnia penè vitæ humanæ subsidia una Totora Uris præstat, hoc enim accolarum est nomen. Ii adeò se ab hominum cæterorum consortio et opinione alienarunt, ut interrogati aliquando, qui sint, seriò responderint, se non homines esse, sed Uros, quod genus ab humano diversum esse sentirent. Urorum reperti sunt populi integri in medio lacu habitantium scaphis quibusdam junceis, quibus inequitant, simul connexis, et ex unâ aliquâ rupe aut stipite religatis. Unde interdum solventes totus populus subitò patriam mutat. Itaque aliquando conquisitus populus urorum hesternis sedibus commutatis, ac ne vestigio quidem relicto, facile vestigantium studium curamque irrisit."-AcOSTA de Naturâ Novi Orbis. Trichomata-Parastasis, or, Athenian Wiggery, No. 119, Bishopsgate-street-within, three doors from the London Tavern. "Ross, by great labour and at vast expence, has exerted all the genius and abilities of the first artists in Europe, to complete his exhibition of ornamental hair in all its luxuriant varieties, and particularly the Sultana head dress, so much admired on the queen's birth-day. "In this exhibition the elegance of nature and convenience of art are so combined, as at once to rival and ameliorate each other. The room is secluded from the view of im |