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"Even so, dread Sir," said the lady; "it is to pray of your royal grace and favour to grant to my orphan children the restitution of the forfeited estates of their father, Sir John Gray, of Groby. Great King! good King! listen to my prayer. Think that the transgressions of the father have been expiated by his death, and that, whatever they were, his infant sons had no participation in them. And oh ! gracious Sire, let not the boldness of their mother, at a time when she knew not the illustrious person with whom she conversed, stand in the way of your Highness's grace and favour towards the children.'

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Thy petition, fair Elizabeth," said the King," is granted, and Heaven prosper the gallant house of Gray of Groby! But now it is my turn to play the supplicant. Thou rememberest a promise made to Edward March-a conditional promise, it is true, but the condition is now performed. The poor youth-rest his soul!-is no more. When King Edward entered his ancient palace of Westminster, he found it necessary to terminate the existence of Edward March."

"Thus lowly," said the Lady' " do I once more crave thy royal pardon. Thou who has proved the husband of the widow, and the father of the fatherless, accept their blessings and their prayers. The land which your Highness has restored to them shall be held for the safeguard of your royal person and the terror of your enemies; but jest not thus cruelly with your handmaid; and pardon the presumption and boldness of which she was unwittingly guilty."

"But under your favour, Lady Gray, said the monarch, laughing," I have not yet proved myself the husband of the widow and the father of the fatherless; and until I do so, I will not accept either their benedictions or their prayers. As the representative of the deceased Edward March, I will take care and see that the promise which was so solemnly made by him be performed. My lords and gentlemen," he added, turning to the wondering courtiers, "Behold your Queen!"

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"God save Queen Elizabeth !". claimed all present. "Long live the noble Queen of England!"

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"And now, my Lord of Canterbury,' said the King, your part in this day's solemnities remains to be performed."

Thus saying, he led the lady Gray to the chapel of the palace, followed by her mother and children, Sir William Woodville, the prelate, and the rest of the courtiers. There the nuptial knot was indissolubly tied between the beggar and the

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"Sweet guest of a true and a faithful heart,
"We part in this world for ever,
"And that is the sting of the conqueror's dart
"From thee with life I sever.

He said, and proffered the semblance, dear,
To me the gem confiding,
While his spirit to peace, from strife and care,
Was slowly and calmly gliding.

But lingering still he murmured of love,
And promised bliss denied him,
As he dimly gazed on the splendour above,
And I pillowed his head beside him.

"Father should e'er you shine in the glance "Of the shadowed seraph there, "You'll wot who she is in her elegance, "And her tresses of golden hair.

"Oh! a smile like the sun on her lips doth play,

"Though it never may beam there more; **But though the rose may be gone away, "The lily will that deplore.

"Like to yon lonesome star in the west, "As bright and as beautiful still, "And as lonely, she'll roam in sorrow drest, "When she weens the grave I fill.

"Oh tell her communing with love I died,

"And when she wanders at even, "To watch the course of yon star to guide "To our meeting bower in heaven."

He ceased; and zephyrs around his head
Wafted his soul from sorrow,
And he quietly lay on the crimsoned mead,
Till the sun-beam illumined the morrow.

The moon in beauty has gleamed o'er his grave,

Where the greedy worm is trailing;

lieve that the administrators of the laws are in earnest in their endeavour to repress the honest labours of the commonwealth of plunderers is a mere delusion, -a mental hallucination-a prejudice which is cultivated with infinite care, for the sole object of rendering the legal possessors of property easy in their minds. It is a pleasing and satisfying belief"amabilis insania, et mentis gratissimus error." The thieves and the police

But kindred ne'er came to the couch of the magistrates know better. The profession

brave,

In tears of woe and wailing.

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THE LEADING PROFESSION.
(Continued from page 284.)

BUT the great encouragement to the adoption of this branch of the profession of the Bar consists in the rich endow ments which Society has provided for its cultivation. All the property, and with it all the gratifications of this earth, are the patrimony of the judicious thief. For him the covetous man gathers his pelf, and the ostentatious man his plate and jewels. In his case there is no tedious waiting for employment; no sighing for years for a "maiden brief," as in the law-no starving for life upon a Welsh curacy, as in the church-no wearing away the best years of life in the sickness of "hope deferred," as with a subaltern or a midshipman-no walking the world for a day's work, as with the starving Irish labourer. In this privileged profession, the supply always keeps pace with the demand. The active world is a community of bees, but the thief gets the honey. His business is "to rove abroad, centum puer artium, to taste of every dish, and sip of every cup." He has no care for the morrow, because he knows that for him the heads and hands of innumerable servants are doing his bidding. He has only to walk forth and choose. He lives in a perpetual belief that the world was made for him :and he is as right as Alexander was.

The times are past when thieves were persecuted. This may appear a paradox to those who look only upon the surface, -who hear of a score of unfortunates perishing annually at the Old Bailey, or behold the Recorder of London pouring into the ear of sovereignty the tale of their sorrows and their crimes. To be

is most diligently patronized by the administrators of the laws; not to speak it profanely, there are regular articles of Co-parceny between the thief and those who are falsely imagined to be his pursuers. "Latro is arraigned and fur sits on the bench." Those who affect to be hunting out the criminal are the dignitaries of the commonwealth of crime.

The mistaken people who, in general, are hanged, or transported, or immured in solitary cells, or whipped, are not registered in the University of Larceny. They are fools who attempt to do business in a small way, without regard to the corporate rights of Bow Street and Union Hall. They have not graduated and they must pay the penalty. But a prudent adventurer never enters the higher walks of the profession without protection. He incurs no risks; he surrenders a handsome portion of his profits to enjoy the remainder in peace" under his own fig-tree." To such the police is not an affair of discovery or of prevention, but of regulation. There is no affectation of a want of union in the several callings of the thief and the officer. They have grown together in happy relationship since the days of Jonathan Wild. A poet of the last century says,

My evenings all I would with sharpers spend,

And make the thief-catcher my bosom friend.

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tration of the laws against felony is the key-stone that binds the arch of depredation. Without magistrates and officers who do not prevent crime, but nurse it, men individually would peril their lives against those who invade their property. But all this possible bloodshed is now saved. A well ordered police, the stipendiaries at once of the public and those who ease the public of their superfluous possessions, accommodates all difficulties, and gradually, the rights of thieves are as effectually recognized as the rights of any other pains taking class of the community. Look at this arrangement, and see, not only how much it has contributed to the respectability of the profession of larceny, but what an insurance of their lives it gives to society, by rendering robbery a quiet, gentlemanly art, in which violence is only the argument of bunglers, and which is carried to the highest point of perfection by that division of labour, upon which all excellence, whether mental or mechanical, must be built.

It occasionally happens that the most brilliant example of professional success is apprehended, convicted, and hanged. This is a part of the contract by which the commonwealth of thieves has purchased its charter. The compact is-for the police a share of profits, and no trouble;-for the sons of Mercury, protection in general, and a very sparing selection of needful victims. When the time arrives that the career of individual happiness and friendship is to close, there is no shrinking. The ripened felon is a soldier, under the orders of a commander whom he honours, and it is to him a gratification to look back upon the years of comfort he has secured by this compromise with power, instead of being perpetually hunted into some pitiful occupa-, tion, which the world calls honest, by a vigilance which should never sleep. At last he dies. Well! in the latest moment he is a privileged being. Fame hovers around him, from the bar to the gallows. He exhibits great composure on his trial; leaves his defence, with a dignified satisfaction, to his council; bows to the judge, when he pronounces sentence; and, fashionably dressed in a complete suit of black." Then come the consolations of spiritual friends. In the interval between the condemnation and the Recorder's report, he becomes perfectly satisfied that he is purified from every stain ;-after the fatal mandate arrives, he declares that his only anxiety is to die, lest he should fall into his former errors, and be deprived of that everlasting happiness which he now feels will be his portion;

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and he leaves the world with such exultations of pious people attending him, as martyrs were wont to monopolize,bowing to the admiring crowd, and "sucking an orange till the drop falls."

We apprehend that in this rapid sketch we have said enough to prove that one calling is still open to the talented and the ambitious, and receives adequate encouragement from the highest authorities. That such a profession, indeed, should have attractions, in comparison with which all others fade into nothingness, is perfectly natural; for the thief feeds upon the fat of the land, in his pilgrimage through this life, and passes from it with the most assured prospects of the highest rewards in the next.-London Magazine.

LEARNED PIGS.

of old, when Burke with indignation rude,
The people named the swinish multitude,
With rage at him, they champed their filthy

jaws,

But now his scorn is scoffed at by the prigs,
Since Birkbeck turn'd them into learned pigs,
Taught them to spell, and grunt in his ap-
plause.
J. W. B.

CUSTOMS OF VARIOUS COUN-
TRIES. (No. XVII.)

THE DIVERSION OF SHOOTING AT THE
BIRD.

The people of Hamburgh amuse them-
selves on the 1st of July by practising
the following diversion called " shooting
"it is celebrated as follows.
at the bird;
A

of the senators, and attended by a milicompany of archers, headed by one tary escort, proceed to a spot out of one of the city gates, where they aim at the wooden figure of a bird, fixed upon a lofty pole. The senator is entitled to the first shot, and the others in succession, till the effigy falls.

This amusement

sometimes continues a whole week. The person who brings down the last fragment of it is decorated with a silver breastplate and medal, and is formally proclaimed 'king" for the ensuing year.'

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Science and Art.

VELOCITY OF STEAM BOATS.

THE immense increase of power requisite to obtain a small increase of velocity, ought to have its influence in determining the speed of a steam boat during a long

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The mechanical power, or power of a steam engine to impel a boat in stillwater, must be as the cube of the velocity. Therefore, if an engine of twelvehorse power will impel a boat seven miles per hour, it will require one of thirty five horse power to impel the same boat at the rate of ten miles per hour. The action of what is called a twenty-five horse power engine, is just equal to the impulse given by 1000 cubic feet of water falling through the height of ten feet.-New Mon.

POWER LOOMS.

The estimated number of looms pro pelled by water and steam power in the United Kingdom, including those in preparation for working previous to the stagnation, and as near as any calculation can be made, is 58,000. The average produce, taking it at 22 square yards a day, makes 1,254,000, or 1741 yards a minute; weekly, 7,524,000; monthly, 31, 300,000; yearly, 376,200,000.

Allowing six yards to each person for yearly consumption, will supply 62,700,000, and will cover 62,700 acres of ground, and in length would extend 213,750 miles

and reach across the Atlantic Ocean seventy-one times.-Ibid.

DESTRUCTION OF SNAILS BY COMMON

SALT.

M. Em. Rousseau had applied common salt as a manure to a small piece of garden, and remarked that where snails had come in contact with the salt they quickly died. Wishing to confirm the fact, he strewed the salt upon the ground, and placed a number of snails amongst it; all those which came out of the shells and touched the salt immediately threw out a greenish, globular froth, and in a few minutes were dead. The fact may be turned to account by agriculturists and gardeners.-Bull. Univ. D. viii. 276.

Anecdotiana.

BEARDS.

The Romans had a great veneration for their beards, even when they adopted through effeminacy, the custom of shaving, they preserved the most religious respect for this mark of manhood. The first shaving of a young man was performed with the greatest ceremony; and the first fruits of the chin were carefully collected in a gold or silver box, in order to be afterwards presented to some God, as a tribute of youth; this pious offering was mostly made to Jupiter Capitolinus.

ALEXANDER THE GREAT.

Alexander making a libation to the heof Achilles, and placed a crown of gold roes at Troy, poured oil upon the tomb son in the world; for while he lived. upon it, saying, he was the happiest perPatroclus was his friend; and when dead, Homer perpetuated his memory.

FRANCIS I. KING OF FRANCE.

This monarch, who was the most distinguished of the kings of France, whether considered as a warrior, or a patroniser of learning or the Liberal Arts, being about to invade Italy, called a council of war to advise with his officers, which way which Amaril, the king's fool, overhearhe should lead his forces over the Alps, ing, told them they should rather consult how to bring them back again out of importance. Well had it been for the Italy, as being an affair of the greatest brave monarch and his followers, had he listened to the wise advice of his witty dependant, for scarce a man of them ever saw France again.

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DATE. DAYS.

Diary and Chronology,

DIARY

DATE.

CORRESPONDING CHRONOLOGY.

May 16 Thurs. St. Dympna, 7th May 15 Ascension Day is set apart to commemorate our

cent. Ascension

Day, or Holy
Thursday.

Sun ris. 13m af. 4
-sets 47m af. 7

16 Frid. St. Abdas.

High Water,

41m af. 3 morn
57m af. 3 even

17 Satur. St. Possidius.

Sun ris. 11m af. 4
sets-49m af. 7

18 SUN. Sunday af Ascen
LES. for the DAY
Deut. 12 c. morn
Deut. 13 c. even.]
St. Potamon, bi
shop of Hera
clea, in Egypt,
died, A. D. 341.

13 Mond. St. Dunstan.
Easter Term ends]
High Water,

25m af. 5 morn.
44m af, 5 even.

-20 Tues. St. Ethelbert,
Sun ris 7m af. 4
-sets 53m af. 7

Saviour's ascension into Heaven.

1821. Died, John Bonnycastle, the author of several valuable and scientific works, one of which, the Scholar's Guide to Arithmetic, has passed through no less than twelve editions. His Treatise upon Astronomy is the most popular of all works written upon that sublime Science, being remarkable for perspicuity, it has become a general library book, and remains a testimony of the attainments of the author, -16 St. Abdas, was a Persian bishop. He was a man of great virtue and zeal. He destroyed the Vesta or Deified fire of the Persians, which act so enraged their king, that he caused him to be put to death, and ordered the destruction of the Christian churches.

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1568. On this day Queen Mary, of Scotland, after the dispersion of her friends by the Regent, Murray, who pursued her with inveteracy for escaping from her confinement in Lochleven castle, fled into England, imploring the protection of Elizabeth, who acted towards her with the great. est baseness, and under the idea of granting her an asylum, betrayed her into a prison.

St. Possidius was bishop of Calamus, in Africa, and died A. D. 430. He was a disciple of St. Augustin.

1729. Expired. the learned divine, Dr. Samuel Clarke, the translator of Sir Isaac Newton's Optics, and editor of the Commentaries of Cæsar. Dr. Clarke was a profound scholar, a close reasoner, an acute critic; well versed in mathematics and philosophy, and a man of unaffected mild and amiable manners.

-18 1806. On this day Bonaparte assumed the title of Napoleon, I. Emperor of the French.

1802. Died, Dr. Erasmus Darwin, a physician and poet of celebrity; author of the Botanic Garden, Zoonomia, or the Laws of Organic Life; the Loves of the Plants, and numerons other works. His works prove him to have been a poet, botanist, and philosopher of no ordinary powers

-19 St. Dunstan was made bishop of Worcester by king Edgar; he was afterwards bishop of London, and archbishop of Canterbury. He died A. D. 988, in the 64th year of his age. Of this saint many miracles are related, among which is the familiar legend of his holding the Devil by the

nose.

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1536. Beheaded, Anne Boleyn, the ill-fated wife of the tyrannical Henry VIII, and mother of Q. Elizabeth. She was tried and condemned for alleged unchastity with her brother and four others, although the charge of incontinence was never substantiated.

1795. Died, James Boswell, the friend and Biographer of Dr. Samuel Johnson, who he accompanied on a tour to the Western Isles of Scotland, in 1773, of which tour he wrote an interesting account.

-20 St. Ethelbert, king of the East Angles, son of Ethelbert, who was converted to Christianity by St. Austin, and was treacherously murdered by Offa, the king of the Mercians, who under the guise of inviting him to marry his daughter, caused him to be beheaded, and thereupon seized his kingdom.

1793. Died, at Geneva, the distinguished Naturalist, Charles Bonnet, T. 78. He was a man of great learning, and author of many works on metaphysics.

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