Then came October, full of merry glee, This is the tenth month of the year. From our Saxon ancestors, "October had the name of Wyn-monat," wyn signifying wine;" and albeit they had not anciently wines made in Germany, yet in this season had they them from divers countries adjoining." They also called it Winter-fulleth.t In noticing the stanza, beneath the above engraving by Mr. Williams from his own design, Mr. Leigh Hunt 66 Spenser, in marching his months be-fore great nature, drew his descriptions of them from the world and its customs in general; but turn his October wine-vats into cider-presses and brewing-tubs, and it will do as well." He continues to observe, that "This month on account of its steady temperature, is chosen for the brewing of such malt liquor as is designed for keeping. The farmer continues to sow his corn, and the gardener plants forest and fruit trees. Many of our readers, though fond of gardens, will learn perhaps for the first time that trees are cheaper things than flowers; and that at the expense of not many shillings, they may plant a little shrubbery, or make a rural skreen for their parlour or study windows, of woodbine, guelder-roses, bays, arbutus, ivy, virgin's bower, or even the poplar, horse-chestnut, birch, sycamore, and plane-tree, of which the Greeks were so fond. A few roses also, planted in the carth, to flower about his walls or windows in monthly succession, are no thing in point of dearness to roses or other flowers purchased in pots. Some of the latter are nevertheless cheap and long-lived, and may be returned to the nursery-man at a small expense, to keep till they flower again. But if the lover of nature has to choose between flowers or flowering shrubs and trees, the latter, in our opinion, are much preferable, inasmuch as while they include the former, they can give a more retired and verdant feeling to a place, and call to mind, even in their very nestling and closeness, something of the whispering and quiet amplitude of nature. "Fruits continue in abundance during this month, as everybody knows from the shop-keeper; for our grosser senses are well informed, if our others are not. We have yet to discover that imaginative pleasures are as real and touching as they, and give them their deepest relish. The additional flowers in October are almost confined to the anemone and scabious; and the flowering-trees and shrubs to the evergreen cytisus. But the hedges (and here let us observe, that the fields and other walks that are free to every one are sure to supply us with pleasure, when every other place fails,) are now sparkling with their abundant berries, the wild rose with the hip, the hawthorn with the haw, the blackthorn with the sloe, the bramble with the black berry; and the briony, privet, honeysuckle, elder, holly, and woody nightshade, with their other winter feasts for the birds. The wine obtained from the elder-berry makes a very pleasant and wholesome drink, when heated over a fire; but the humbler sloe, which the peasants eat, gets the start of him in reputation, by changing its name to port, of which wine it certainly makes a considerable ingredient. A gentleman, who lately figured in the beau-monde, and carried coxcombry to a pitch of the ingenious, was not aware how much truth he was uttering in his pleasant and disavowing definition of port wine: A strong intoxicating liquor much drank by the lower orders.' "Swallows are generally seen for the last time this month, the house-martin the latest. The red-wing, field-fare, snipe, Royston crow, and wood-pigeon, return from more northern parts. The rooks return to the roost trees, and the tortoise begins to bury himself for the winter. The mornings and afternoons increase in mistiness, though the middle of the day is often very fine; and no weather when it is unclouded, is apt to give a clearer and manlier sensation than that of October. One of the most curious natural appearances is the gossamer, which is an infinite multitude of little threads shot out by minute spiders, who are thus wafted by the wind from place to place. "The chief business of October, in the great economy of nature, is dissemination, which is performed among other means by the high winds which now return. Art imitates her as usual, and sows and plants also. We have already mentioned the gardener. This is the time for the domestic cultivator of flowers to finish planting as well, especially the bulbs that are intended to flower early in spring. And as the chief business of nature this month is dissemination or vegetable birth, so its chief beauty arises from vegetable death itself. We need not tell our readers we allude to the changing leaves with all their lights and shades of green, amber, red, light red, light and dark green, white, brown, russet, and yellow of all sorts." The orient is lighted with crimson glow, And the glorious roll of nature now The autumn has tinged the trees with gold, And the full seed sleeps in earth's bosom cold; · Bowring. The beadles and Servants of the worshipful company of salters are to attend divine service at St. Magnus church, London-bridge, pursuant to the will of sir John Salter, who died in the year 1605; who was a good benefactor to the said company, and ordered that the beadles and servants should go to the said church the first week in October, three times each person, and say, "How do you do brother Salter? I hope you aré well!"* FLORAL DIRECTORY. Lowly Amaryllis. Amaryllis humilis. October 2. Feast of the Holy Angel-Guardians. St. Guardian-Angels. The festival of "the Holy Angel-Guardians" as they are called by Butler, is this day kept by his church. He says that, "according to St. Thomas," when the angels were created, the lowest among them were enlightened by those that were supreme in the orders. It is not to be gathered from him how many orders there were; but Holme says, that "after the fall of Lucifer the bright star and his company, there remained still in heaven more angels then ever there was, is, and shall be, men born in the earth." He adds, that they are "ranked into nine orders or • Annual Register, 1759. chorus, called the nine quoires of holy. Some authors put them in this sequence: 1. seraphims; 2. cherubims; 3. thrones; 4. dominions; 5. virtues; 6. powers; 7. principalities; 8. archangels; 9. angels. Holme adds, that "God never erected any order, rule, or government, but the devil did and will imitate him for where God hath his church, the devil will have his synagogue." The latter part of this affirmation is versified by honest Daniel De Foe. He begins his "Trueborn Englishman" with it :— a Wherever God erects a house of prayer Angel, in its primitive sense, denotes messenger, and frequently signifies men, when, from the common notion of the term, it is conceived to denote ministering spirits. Angels, as celestial intelligences, have been the objects of over curious inquiry, and of worship. Paul prohibits this: "Let no man," he says, "beguile you of your reward, in a voluntary humility, and the worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he bath not seen." An erudite and sincere writer remarks, that "The worship, which so many christians pay to angels and saints, and images and relics, is really a false worship, hardly distinguishable from idolatry. When it is said, in excuse, that they worship these only as mediators,' that alters the case very little; since to apply to a false mediator is as much a departure from Jesus Christ, our only advocate, as to worship a fictitious deity is withdrawing our faith and allegiance from the true God."† Amid the multiplicity of representations by Roman catholic writers concerning angels, are these by Father Lewis Henriques, "That the streets of Paradise are adorned with tapestry, and all the histories of the world are engraven on the walls by excellent sculptors; that the angels have no particular houses, but go from one quarter to another for diversity; that they put on women's habits, and appear to the saints in the dress of ladies, with curles and locks, with waistcoats and fardingales, and the richest linens." This occupation of the angels agrees with the occupations that Henriques assigns to the saints; who, according to him, are to enjoy, with other pleasures, the recreation of bathing: "There shall be pleasant bathes for that purpose; they shall swim like fishes, and sing as melodious as nightingales; the men and women shall de light themselves with muscarades, feasts and ballads; women shall sing more pleasantly than men, that the delight may be greater; and women shall rise again with very long hair, and shall appear with ribands and laces as they do upon earth." municates this information in a book Father Henriques was a Jesuit, and comentitled, "The Business of the Saints in thority of Father Prado, the Provincial Heaven." published by the written auof the order of Jesuits at Castille, dated at Salamanca, April 28th, 1631. Moral Practice of the Jesuits, Lond. 12mo. 160. out this long life enjoyed a state of uninterrupted health; and retained her memory and perception to the end with a clearness truly astonishing. Till the day previous to her decease she was not confined to her bed; and on the 105th anniversary of her birth, entertained a party of her relatives who visited her to celebrate the day she lived to see a numerous progeny to the fifth generation, and at her death there are now living children, grand-children, great-grand-children, and great-great-grand-children to the number of one hundred and twenty-one." An intelligent correspondent writes: "As it is not an every-day' occurrence for people to live so long, perhaps you may be pleased to immortalize Hannah Want, by giving her a leaf of your Every-Day Book." That the old lady may live as long after her death as this work shall be her survivor the Editor can promise," with remainder over" to his survivors. Hannah Want was of a serious and sedate turn; not very talkative, yet cheerfully joining in conversation. She was a plain, frugal, careful wife and mother; less inclined to insist on rights, than to perform duties; these she executed in all respects, "and all without hurry or care." Her stream of life was a gentle flow of equanimity, unruffled by storm or accident, till it was exhausted. She was never put out of her way but once, and that was when the house wherein she lived at Bungay was burned down, and none of the furniture saved, save one featherbed. In answer to a series of questions from the Editor, respecting this aged and respectable female, addressed to another correspondent, he says, “What a work you make about an old woman! I'll answer none of your siliy questions; ax Briant!' as a neighbouring magistrate said to sir Edmund Bacon, who was examining him in a court of justice. The old woman was well enough. There is nothing more to be learned about her, than how long a body may crawl upon the earth, and think nothing worth thinking of thought; and how long a person to whom naught is every thing, and every thing is nothing', did nothing worth doing. I suppose that the noted H. W. knew as much of life in 105 hours, as Hannah Want did in 105 years. All I know or can learn about her is nothing, and if you can make any thing of it you may. Some of our free-knowledgists, with a pale cast of thought' have taken a castof her head, and discovered that her organ of self-destructiveness was harmonized by the organ of long-livitiveness." This latter correspondent is too hard upon Hannah; but he encloses information on another subject that may be useful hereafter, and therefore what he amusingly says respecting her, is at the service of those readers who are qualified to make something of nothing. Hannah Want, in common with all long-livers, was an early riser. The following particulars are derived from a correspondent. She was seldom out of bed after nine at night, and even in win--as if thinking was but an idle waste ter; and towards the last of her life, was seldom in it after six in the morning. Her sleep was uniformly sound and tranquii; her eye-sight till within the last three years was clear; her appetite, till two days before her death, good; her memory excellent; she could recollect and discourse on whatever she knew during the last century. Her diet was plain common food, meat and poultry, pudding and dumpling, bread and vegetables in moderate quantities; she drank temperately, very temperately, of good, very good, mild home-brewed beer. During the last twenty years she had not taken tea, though to that period she had been accustomed to it. She never had the small pox, and never had been ill. Her first seventy-five years were passed at Bungay in Suffolk, her last thirty at the adjoining village of Ditchingham in Norfolk. She was the daughter of a farmer named Knighting. Her husband, John Want, a maltster, died on Christmas-day, 1802, at the age of eighty-five, leaving Hannah ill provided for, with an affectionate and dutiful daughter, who was better than house and land; for she cherished her surviving parent when "age and want, that ill-matched pair, make countless thousands meurn." A portrait of Hannah Want, in 1824, when she was in her 104th year, taken by Mr. Robert Childs, "an ingenious gentleman" of Bungay, and etched by him, furnishes the present engraving of her. FLORAL DIRECTORY Friars' Minors Soapwort. Saponaria |
