appearance, while some gave them money o get the mawkin carried off. Its precise meaning under that form is doubtful, though it seems likely to have purported the death of Winter, and to have been only a part of another ceremony conducted by a larger body of boys, from whom the death-carriers were a detachment, and who consisted of a large assemblage carrying two figures to represent Spring and Winter, whereof one was called "Sommer stout"

Apparelde all in greene, and drest

in youthful fine arraye;
The other Win' er, cladde in mosse,

with heare all hoare and graye.* These two figures they bore about, and fought; in the fight Summer, or Spring, got the victory over Winter, and thus was allegorized the departure or burial of the death of the year, and its commencement or revival as Spring. The custom described on March the 6th, (p. 339,) was only a variation of the present, wherein also the boys carried about cracknels or cakes:Thus children also beare, with speares,

their cracknelles round about.+

It is still a custom on Mid-Lent Sunday in many parts of England, for servants and apprentices to carry cakes or some nice eatables or trinkets, as presents to their parents; and in other parts, to visit their mother for a meal of furmity, or to receive cakes from her with her blessing. This is called going a mothering. Herrick men

tions this custom in Gloucestershire :

I'le to thee a simnell bring 'Gainst thou go'st a mothering, So that when she blesseth thee Half that blessing thoul't give me. Going a mothering is from the Roman catholic custom of going to the motherchurch on Mid-Lent Sunday, to make of ferings at the high altar; and that custom of the Romish Church is derived from the Hilaria, a heathen festival celebrated by the ancient Romans, in honour of the Mother of the Gods on the ides of March.§ The offerings at the altars were in their origin voluntary, and became church property. At length the parish priests compounded with the church at a certain sum, and these voluntary donations of the people have become the dues known by the name of Easter Offerings.

Mid-Lent, or Mothering Sunday is likewise called Refreshment Sunday, "the

reason of which," says Wheatly, (on the Common Prayer) "I suppose is the Gospel for that day, which treats of our Saviour's miraculously feeding five thonsand; or else, perhaps, from the first lesson in the morning, which gives us the story of Joseph entertaining his brethren." It is also denominated Rose Sunday, from the pope on this day carrying a golden rose in his hand, which he exhibits on his way to and from mass.*

On this day at Seville there is an usage evidently the remains of an old custom. Children of all ranks, poor and gentle, appear in the streets fantastically dressed, somewhat like English chimneysweepers on May-day, with caps of gilt and coloured paper, and coats made of the crusade bulls of the preceding year. During the whole day they make an incessant din with drums and rattles, and cry "Saw down the old woman." At midnight,parties of the commonalty parade the streets, knock at every door, repeat the same cries, and conclude by sawing in two the figure of an old woman representing Lent. This division is emblematical of Mid-Lent.†

FLORAL DIRECTORY

Heartsease. Viola Tricolor. Dedicated to St. Euphrasia.

March 14.

St. Maud, or Mathildis, Queen, A. v. 968. Sts. Acepsimas, Bishop. Joseph, and Aithilahas, A. D. 380. St.. Boniface, Bishop of Ross, about 630

CHRONOLOGY.

1733. The Excise scheme was first moved in the House of Commons, by resolutions, which were powerfully resisted, but on the 16th finally carried, and the Excise bill brought in. On the 4th of April the bill was read a first time, and carried by a majority of 36; the majority being 236, the minority 200. There were petitions against it from every trading town of the kingdom, and great tumults attacked on their way to parliament. in London; the obnoxious members were The measure was so unpopular that it was for that time dropped, whereon public feeling was manifested by general illuminations, and other rejoicings.

1757.

Admiral John Byng, second son of lord viscount Torrington, was shot at Portsmouth, under the sentence of a

Shepherd, on Common Prayer.
Doblado's Letters

court martial, for not having done his duty in an action between the British and Frenen fleets on the 20th of May preceding. After he had made his defence, and conducted himself throughout the trial with coolness and courage, he was so sure of acquittal, that he ordered his coach to be in waiting to convey him to London. He suffered on board the Monarque with undaunted firmness, walking out of the cabin with unchanged countenance to the quarter-deck,where the marines were stationed to execute the sentence. He desired to die with his eyes uncovered; but on its being represented that his intrepid looks might intimidate the soldiers, and frustrate their aim, he ted a handkerchief over his eyes, and then dropping another, five musket balls passed through his body, and he fell dead instantly. An historian of the day says of him, that "Whatever his errors and indiscretions might have been, he seemed to have been rashly condemned, meanly given up, and cruelly sacrificed to vile considerations." It is believed that popular fury had been excited against him by various arts, and especially by the suppression of important passages in his official despatches. He delivered a paper to the marshal of the admiralty on the

morning of his death, wherein he expressed his conviction, that he should hereafter be regarded as a victim to divert the indignation and resentment of an injured and deluded people from the proper objects, and that his very enemies believed him innocent.

1797. Courtney Melmoth died at Bath, aged 89 years; he translated part of "Cicero's Works," and "Pliny's Epistles," and wrote "Fitzosborne's Letters," and the Memoirs of a late eminent Advocate;" his father was the author of "The great Importance of a Religious Life."

66

March 15.

St. Abraham, Hermit, and his neice, St. Mary, 4th Cent. St. Zachary, Pope,

4. D. 752.

CHRONOLOGY.

Forty-four years before Christ, Julius Cæsar was assassinated by Brutus and his associates in the senate-house of Rome, in the 56th year of his age. He is said to have conquered three hundred nations, taken eight hundred cities, defeated three hundred millions of men, and slain one hundred millions on the field of battle. He was learned himself, and an encourager of learning and the arts. He wrote the "Commentaries on the wars of Gaul," a book which bears his name, and which would have been lost in the bay of Alexandria, if he had not swam from his ship with his book in one hand, and his arms in the other. His ruling passion was ambition, yet he was a slave to sensuality; with talents that might have made him the protector of Roman liberty he destroyed it.

1784. Dr. Thomas Franklin, translator of Sophocles, Phalaris, and Lucian, died. He was born about 1720, and wrote two tragedies, the "Earl of Warwick" and "Matilda."

FLORAL DIRECTORY.

Coltsfoot. Tussilago Farfala.
Dedicated to St. Zachery.

Lasting Mercury. Mercurialis perennis.

Dedicated to St. Abraham.

March 16.

St. Julian, of Cilicia. St. Finian, surnamed Lobhar, or the Leper.

St. Finian.

He was descended from Alild, king o. Munster, built the abbey of Innis-Fallen in an island on the lake of Loughlane, county of Kerry; another at Ardfinnan, in Tipperary; and a third at Cluin-more Madoc, in Leinster, where he was buried.*

St.

It is related of St. Finian, that he visited St. Ruadanus, who had a miraculous tree in his cell, dropping a liquor so peculiar, into a vessel from nine o'clock to sun-set, that it sufficed to dine him and all his brotherhood every day. Finian's visit was to persuade St. Ruadanus to live like other people; therefore, when St. Finian came to the tree, he signed it with the sign of the cross, by virtue of which the liquor ceased to flow after nine o'clock. This was in the absence of Ruadanus, who being informed on his return, that St. Finian and others had come to see him, he ordered his servant

Butler's Saints.

to prepare the miraculous water dinner as usual; the servant surprised to find the vessel empty, told his master, who bade him to fill it with common water from a fountain, which he had no sooner done, than the water was changed into the. liquor that flowed from the tree. St. Ruadanus ordered the man to carry it to St. Finian, who making a cross over the liquor, changed it back to water, and said why is this liquor of a false name given to me? St. Finian's companions urged him to go and cross the fountain as he had crossed the tree; but Finian answered, it would only grieve Ruadanus, who would go to the next bog, and change the water there into the same liquor. In the end, St. Finian and his companions persuaded St. Ruadanus not to work any more miracles, but to live as others did, whereunto he yielded. Thus St. Finian having outmiracled the miracle of St. Ruadanus, and stopped him from working the same miracle again, departed with his companions.*

CHRONOLOGY.

who died in 432. Determined on attempting the conversion of the people, he penetrated to the remotest corners of Ireland, baptized multitudes, ordained clergy to preside over them, instituted monks, gave alms to the poor of the provinces, made presents to the kings, educated children to serve at the altar, held councils, founded monasteries, restored health to the sick, sight to the blind, raised dead persons to life, continued his missions during forty years, and died at Down in Ulster, where he was buried. Such, in brief, is Alban Butler's account, who assigns the year 464, for a period wherein he lived.

Ribadeneira affirms it, as a most famous miracle, and well known to the whole world, that St. Patrick did so free Ireland of all venomous beasts, that none could ever since breed or live there, and that even the very wood has a virtue against poison," so that it is reported of king's college, Cambridge, that being built of Irish wood, no spider doth ever come near it."

Jocelin, a Cistercian monk of Furnes in the twelfth century, wrote "The Life and Acts of St. Patrick," wherein he relates many extraordinary particulars, of which the few that follow are specimens: St. Patrick when a child in winter time brought home some pieces of ice, his nurse told him he had better have brought home wood, whereupon he heaped together the ice, and prayed, and the ice immediately became a bonfire. After this his foster-father died, and to relieve his nurse's distress, St. Patrick prayed, signed him with the sign of the cross, and so restored him to life. Then by the same sign he freed a cow from an evil spirit; recovered five cows she had wounded; and, by the same means, when his nurse was ill and longed for honey, he "immediately changed water into the best honey." At another time, when she was commanded to clean out some filthy stables, St. Patrick prayed, and they were cleaned without hands. Then St. Patrick himself was carried into slavery, and sold for a kettle; but the kettle being placed on the fire, the hotter the fire burned, the colder became the kettle; whereupon the seller of St. Patrick returned the kettle, took St. Patrick back, and the vessel was restored to its wonted power of boiling. St. Patrick desiring to eat meat, obtained some pork, and having concealed it for a convenient season, presently

he saw a man with eyes before and eyes behind, and asked him why he was so formed; the seer answered, "I am the servant of God; with the eyes in my forehead I see things open to view, with my eyes behind I see a monk hiding flesh meat in a vessel to satisfy his appetite privately." Then the seer vanished. St. Patrick repented, prayed for pardon, besought for a sign that he had it, was told by an angel to put the pork into water, did as the angel bid him, and the pork "immediately became fishes." Having journeyed into Britain, he saw a leper whom mariners would not carry in their ship, whereon St. Patrick took a stone altar consecrated by the pope, cast it into the sea, caused the leper to sit on it, and the leper immediately set sail on the stone, kept company with the ship all the voyage, and got into port with her at the same time. St. Patrick, returning to Ireland, on approaching the shore, saw a multitude of devils in the form of a globe surrounding the whole island, when he "raised his sacred right hand, made the sign of the cross, and, unhurt and unterrified, passed he over." Some fishermen in the county of Leinster, drawing their nets from a river loaded with fish, St. Patrick asked them for some; they refused him; he cursed them, and the river; and from that day the river never produced fish. Once when the chief king of Ireland or dered his subjects to prevent St. Patrick from landing, they set a fierce dog at him, whereupon the dog stiffened like a stone; then a gigantic man brandished his sword at the saint, the man stiffened likewise, but repented, and St. Patrick unstiffened him, and baptized him. An old man, would not believe St. Patrick's preaching. St Patrick asked him whether he would be persuaded by a miracle; the old man said he would, then St. Patrick prayed, laid his hand on him, "and immediately the old man became beautiful and young, and flourished again, as in his early youth," and was so made to believe. Having converted Mochna, a virtuous swineherd, while they were conversing together, a staff from heaven fell between them, which St. Patrick gave to Mochna for a pastoral staff, consecrated him bishop of Edrum, "and the staff is in that church still preserved, and called the flying staff."

St. Patrick's nephew, St. Lumanus, being desirous of taking a journey by sea when wind and tide were against him, he hoisted the sails, trusted in the merits of

St. Patrick, and, "O, miracle till then unheard and unknown! the ship, without any pilot, sailed against wind and stream," and he made a prosperous voyage. At another time, St. Patrick seeing a hundred men unable to stir a large stone, he, alone, raised it up, and placed it where it was wanted. He was accustomed to stop and erect a cross at the head-stone of every christian who was buried outside of a burial-place; one day, coming to the graves of two men newly buried, and observing that one of the graves only had a cross over it, he stopped his chariot, and speaking to the dead man below, asked him what religion he had been, the dead man answered a pagan, St. Patrick inquired why then a cross was put over him, the dead pagan replied, he who is buried near me was a christian, and one of your faith coming hither placed the cross at my head; the saint stepped out of his chariot, rectified the mistake, and went his way. One Foylge, an idolator, strangled the driver of St. Patrick's chariot, in his seat, wherefore the saint cast his "holy curse at Foylge, who pierced thereby, fell dead into hell; but the devil entering the dead body, walked about in it, and seemed as if he were Foylge himself, till one day St. Patrick called at the dead man's house, and asking the family where Foylge was, they answered he was at home, when the saint told them of Foylge's death, and that Satan "had entered into his corpse and occupied it as his own proper vessel," then St. Pa trick gave notice to the devil to leave his lodging in Foylge's body, which he did immediately, and Foylge was buried. Preaching on a journey to 14,000 men, "he first fed them all with spiritual food," then commanding a cow to be killed, with two stags, and a couple of boars, the people ate abundantly, the remnants gathered up; and "thus with the flesh of five animals, did St. Patrick plenteously feed 14,000 men." Once when he was preaching, by way of a strong argument, he raised to life nineteen dead men, one of whom had been buried for ten years. After that, St. Patrick passing over a river one of his teeth dropped into the water, and his disciples could not find it till night, when the tooth in the river shone as a radiant star, and being so discovered was brought to St. Patrick, who on that spot built a church, and deposited his tooth beneath the altar. Desiring to pass an impassable river, and no boat being

were

at hand, St. Patrick prayed, and dividing the river, made himself and followers a free passage, then "he blessed the river, and being so blessed, it abounded in fishes above all others." St. Mel being denounced unjustly to St. Patrick, and preferring to prove his innocence by a miracle rather than by an oath, he ploughed up the earth on a certain hill, and took by the ploughshare many and large fishes out of the dry land; thereupon St. Patrick absolved him, but lest St. Mel should continue to work miracles presumptuously, "he bade him that he should thenceforth plough on the land, and fish in the water.' St. Patrick had a goat, a thief stole it, and ate it, and when accused, denied it; but the goat bleating in the stomach of the thief, proclaimed the merit of St. Patrick; and, to increase the miracle, by the sentence of the saint, all the posterity of the man were marked with the beard of a goat. St. Patrick having laboured to convert a tyrant, who laughed him to scorn, he immediately converted the tyrant, against his will, into a fox; which fox went off with a hard run, and could never be found. Another time being benighted in the open air, violent rain fell around St. Patrick and his companions, but did not wet them a drop. On the same night, the driver of his chariot could not for the darkness find the horses to re-yoke them, on which St. Patrick, drawing his right hand from his sleeve, and lifting up his fingers, they "shone even as sun-beams, and wonderfully illumining the whole country, turned darkness into light, and night into day-then by the aid of the radiant miracle, the chariot-driver found his steed." After the death of St. Patrick, there was no night for twelve days.

These are some of the miracles attributed to St. Patrick by Jocelin, whose life of him published in "Dublin, Printed for the Hibernia Press Company, By James Blyth," is sold in London by Messrs. Keating and Brown, Catholic Printers and Publishers, No. 38, Duke-street, Grosvenor-square, in one volume 12mo. containing 264 pages, price 28. 6d. in boards.

To what extent Catholics believe suck miracles, as have been just related is unknown to a Protestant; but the publication of Jocelin's works by catholic booksellers in a cheap form, seems to sig

nify that it is held in repute by Catholics in a humble rank of life. To what extent the catholic clergy have instructed this class of their flocks, or rather to what extent they design to instruct them, is also unknown to a Protestant; but should the higher classes of catholics enjoy the civil rights, which the most wise and enlightened of their Protestant fellow-subjects deplore they do not possess, and most anxiously desire they should possess, it is not too much to hope that it will become the anxious wish, as it is the positive duty of the catholic clergy to inform the igno rant of their community. An union between the church of England, or any other protestant church, and the church of Rome, never can take place; but protestant churchmen, and Protestants of all denominations, can and will unite with Catholics, if Catholics can and will unite with them, to enlighten the Egyptian darkness, which enslaves the mind worse than Egyptian bondage. The education of helpless infancy, and the fixation of just principles in youth, form the best security against criminal manhood. In this, surely, both Protestants and Catholics will concur, and their earnest cooperation to obtain this security will be a firm pledge that each desires the welfare of each. The marked separation of churches and doctrines cannot much longer separate man from man. In the bigotted and selfish interests that dam the social affections, there are incurable and daily widening breaches: the issues alternate and vary, but the first high tide of mutual kindness will burst the restrictions, and sweep them away for ever

St. Patrick's Day.

This being the anniversary of the day whereon St. Patrick died, it is commemo rated as a high festival in the catholic church; and it is celebrated to his honour in that country, with every demonstration of affection for his memory as the apostle and patron saint of Ireland, that a warmhearted, enthusiastic, joyous people, can possibly express. An eye-witness represents to the editor of the Every-Day Book that St. Patrick's day in Dublin is a scene of festivity and mirth unequalled by any thing observable in this country. From the highest to the lowest, all hearts seem inspired by the saint's beneficence. day-break flags fly on the steeples, and

At