Customs of Various Countries.

ST. VALENTINE's day. The custom of choosing Valentines is of long standing, and as early as the fifteenth century it was practised in England. Like many other observances, it is no more than an analogy to a custom that prevailed when paganism flourished. At the festival of the Roman Lupercalia, amidst other ceremonies, it was usual to put the names of a number of young women into a box, from which they were drawn by the men as chance directed. The pastors of the early Christian Church, who endeavoured to eradicate the vestiges of pagan superstition, substituted in the sent instance the names of particular saints in lieu of those of the women; and as the festival of the Lupercalia used to take place about the middle of February, they chose St. Valentine's day for celebrating the new feast.

pre

Grose explains Valentine to mean, the first woman seen by a man, or man seen by woman on that day.

Among the proverbial observations concerning Husbandry at various seasons of the year, exists the following,

On Valentine's day will a good goose lay.
If she be a good goose, her dame well to pay,
She will lay two eggs before Valentine's day.

COLLOP MONDAY.

is the Monday preceding Shrove Tuesday, and was so termed because it was the last day of eating meat before Lent. In the north of England, and many other parts of the kingdom, it is usual, for dinner fare, to have eggs and collops, collops being meat cut into steaks for salting, and hung up to keep..

SHROVE TUESDAY.

The finish of the Carnival. On this day the festival of the Carnival ends, when the ceremony of Femmes folles,' or foolish women is observed: this custom takes place only when any one has commenced house-keeping in the course of the year. The married women who are not the youngest in the village, meet together, and disguise themselves by putting the front part of their caps behind, to which rags are suspended, and by blacking their faces: thus arrayed they proceed, dancing and singing, to the domicile of the new housekeeper. Having gained admittance, they leap, jump, and dance about, and sing couplets and songs adapted to the occasion, and to the music of the epistle at grand mass. This is a specimen :

Comme cette semaine nous serons traitees,
Le lundi du bouilli,
Le mardi du roti,

Le mercredi du jambon,
Le jeudi un capon,
Le vendredi du sammon,
Le samedi du poisson,
Le dimanche au matin,

Des saucisses et du boudin. "What a treat we shall have this

week! Monday, bouilli*; Tuesday, roastmeat; Wednesday, ham; Thursday, a capon; Friday, salmon; Saturday, fish; and on Sunday morning, sausages and black puddings."

From this specimen, our readers will be enabled to judge of the rest. The inhabitants of the house are bound to regale the actresses in this burlesque scene; and if they refuse, the women make no scruple of taking away what furniture they like and carry it to the wine house, (cabaret,) where it is deposited as a pledge for the entertainment they may choose to order; and the proprietor of it must pay the cabaretier his bill before he is allowed to redeem his effects. The women say that they come to search for the andouille, (a kind of large sausage,) and for the groulée a name given to the feast formerly held under similar circumstances.

Time's Telescope for 1828.

Anecdotiana.

DOCTOR BALGUY.

THE celebrated Doctor Balguy, author of the work on Divine Benevolence; after having delivered an exceeding good disof which was, " All wisdom is sorrow,” course at Winchester Cathedral, the text received the following extempore, but elegant compliment, from Dr. Watson, then at Winchester school:

If what you advance, dear Doctor, be true, "That wisdom is sorrow," how wretched are you.

THE CAUSE OF CONFINEMENT.

A country girl on the point of marriage, was presented a ring by her sweetheart with these words, "Here Betty, here's a present for you; I brought it all the way from Bawtry fair, and gave ten good silver shillings for it." "Ah! John, but I must give more for it than you did.” "Nonsense!" echoed John, "I'll give it to ye, I tell ye." "But I don't mean that, you know John, I must give my liberty for it."

"Liberty-why yes, you may be confined about once a year." B.

A

The meat of which soup has been made.

DATE. DAYS.

DIARY.

DATE.

CORRESPONDING CHRONOLOGY.

Q. Mary of Scotland, was murdered. The house wherein Darnley slept was blown up. Many writers have supposed that this tragical scene was acted with the connivance of Q. Mary; but whether it was or not, it has left a stain on Mary's character that will never be effaced.

11 1694-Born on this day, at Paris, the voluminous writer, Voltaire. He received his education in the College of Louls the Great, and was intended for the law, which vocation he renounced for literary pursuits. His works comprise poetry, the drama, history, philosophy, and fiction. The whole collected have been printed in 70 vols. 8vo. 763-Died, at his residence the Leasowes, near Hagley, in Worcestershire, William Shenstone, the eminent pastoral poet and essayist. 12/1554-Beheaded on this day Lady Jane Grey and her husband, Lord Guilford Dudley.

1825-Anniversary of the death of J. H. Parry, the author of several poems inserted in the Welch Melodies, and projector of The Cambro Briton.' A few months previous to his death, Mr. Parry completed and published the first volume of his Cambrian Plutarch.

13 St. Gregory, in 715, succeeded Constantine in the pontificate. He died A.D. 731.

1688-Anniversary of the proclaiming King William and Queen Mary King and Queen, and also of the Revolution.

1691-The inhuman massacre of Glencoe, in Scotland, took place on this day. Glencoe is famed as the birth-place of Ossian.

14 St. Valentine was a priest of Rome, who, after enduring a cruel imprisonment, was beaten with clubs, and then beheaded, by order of the second Claudius.

1779-On this day the celebrated circumnavigator and discoverer, Capt. James Cook, was killed by the natives of Owhyhee, the largest of the Sandwich Islands.

15 St. Sigefrid, Bishop of Sweden, died A.D. 1002. 1731-Anniversary of the death of the eloquent Francis Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester, AT, 69. He was banished the kingdom for life, on sus picior of being engaged in a plot to bring in the Pretender.

16

Our saint, who was of the family of the Counts of Segui, was elected to the papal cbair in 1271; he died A.D. 1276.

1497-Born on this day Philip Melancthon, the celebrated German divine-he was coadjutor with Luther in the Reformation.

17 This saint was patriarch of Constantinople in 447; he was afterwards banished to Lydia, and died there in 449.

1563-Expired on this day at Rome, the famous painter, sculptor, and architect, Michael Buonarotti, a man of universal talent and acquirement. 1673-Anniversary of the death of the celebrated French comedian and author, Moliere. He was seized with death whilet performing a character in one of his own plays at Paris, his native place, in the 53d year of his age.

18 This saint, who was a Bishop of Jerusalem, died A.D. 116.

1478-On this day the Duke of Clarence, brother of Edw. IV. was drowned in a butt of malmsey whilst confined in the Tower of London.

19 Our saint was patron and bishop of Benevento he died A.D. 682.

1473-Born at Thorn, in Prussia, on this day, Ni

cholas Copernicus, the celebrated astronomer.

THE ancient Province of Poictou, in France, has long been celebrated in the annals of Romance, as one of the most famous haunts of those dreadful animals, whose species is between a phantom and a beast of prey; and which are called by the Germans, Wehr-Wolves, and by the French, Bisclavarets, or Loups Garoux. To the English, these midnight terrors are yet unknown, and almost without a name; but when they are spoken of in this country, they are called, by way of eminence, Wild Wolves. The common superstition concerning them is, that they are men in compact with the Arch Enemy, who have the power of assuming the form and nature of wolves at certain periods. The hilly and woody district of the Upper Limousin, which now forms the Southern division of the Upper Vienne, was that particular part of the Province which the Wehr-Wolves were supposed to inhabit; whence, like the animal which gave them their name, they would wander out VOL. I. H

by midnight, far from their own hills and mountains, and run howling through the silent streets of the nearest towns and villages, to the great terror of all the inhabitants; whose piety, however, was somewhat increased by these supernatural visitations.

There once stood in the suburbs of the Town of St. Yrieux, which is situate in those dangerous parts of ancient Poictou, an old, but handsome Maison-de-Plaisance, or, in plain English, a countryhouse, belonging, by ancient descent, to the young Baroness Louise Joliedame; who, out of a dread of the terrible WehrWolves, a well-bred horror at the chambres a l'antique which it contained, and a greater love for the gallant Court of Francis I., let the Chateau to strangers; though they occupied but a very small portion of it, whilst the rest was left unrepaired, and was rapidly falling to decay. One of the parties by whom the old mansion was tenanted, was a country Chirurgeon, named Antoine Du Pilon; who, (according to his own account,) was not only well acquainted with the science of 7-SATURDAY, FEB. 23.

Galen and Hippocrates, but was also a profound adept in those arts, for the learning of which some men toil their whole lives away, and are none the wiser; such as alchemy, converse with spirits, magic, and so forth. Dr. Du Pilon had abundant leisure to talk of his knowledge at the little Cabaret of St. Yrieux, which bore the sign of the Chevalier Bayard's Arms, where he assembleed round him many of the idler members of the town, the chief of whom were Cuirbouilli, the currier; Malbois, the joiner; La Jacquette, the tailor; and Nicole Bonvarlet, his host; together with several other equally arrant gossips, who all swore roundly, at the end of each of their parleys, that Doctor Antoine Du Pilon was the best Doctor, and the wisest man in the whole world! To remove, however, any wonder that may arise in the reader's mind, how a professor of such skill and knowledge should be left to waste his abilities so remote from the patronage of the great, it should be remarked, that in such cases as had already come before him, he had, not been quite so successful as could have

been experted, or desired, since old Genefrede Corbeau, who was frozen almost double with age and ague, he kept cold and fasting, to preserve her from fever; and he would have cut off the leg of Pierre Faucille, the reaper, when he wounded his right arm in harvest time, to prevent the flesh from mortifying downwards!

In a retired apartment of the same deserted mansion where this mirror of chirurgeons resided, dwelt a peasant and his daughter, who had come to St. Yrienx from a distant part of Normandy, and of whose history nothing was known, but that they seemed to be in the deepest poverty; although they neither asked relief, nor uttered a single complaint. Indeed, they rather avoided all discourse with their gossiping neighbours, and even with their fellow inmates, excepting so far as the briefest courtesy required; and as they were able, on entering their abode, to place a reasonable security for payment in the hands of old Gervais, the Baroness Joliedame's steward, they were permitted to live in the old Chateau with little ques

tioning, and less sympathy. The father appeared in general to be a plain, rude peasant, whom poverty had somewhat tinctured with misanthropy: though there were times when his bluntness towered into a haughtiness not accordant with his present station, but seemed like a relique of a higher sphere, from which he had fallen. He strove, and the very endeavour increased the bitterness of his heart to mankind, to conceal his abject indigence; but that was too apparent to all, since he was rarely to be found at St. Yrieux, but led a wild life in the adjacent mountains and forests, occasionally visiting the town, to bring to his daughter Adele a portion of the spoil, which, as a hunter, he indefatigably sought for the subsistence of both. Adele, on the contrary, though she felt as deeply as her father the sad reverse of fortune to which they were exposed, had more gentleness in her sorrow, and more content in her humiliation. She would, when he returned to the cottage, worn with the fatigue of his forest labours, try, but many times in vain, to bring a smile to his face, and consolation to his heart. "My father," she would say, "quit, I beseech you, this wearisome hunting for some safer employment, nearer home. You depart, and I watch in vain for your return; days and nights pass away, and you come not!-while my disturbed imagination will ever whisper the danger of a forest midnight, fierce howling wolves, and robbers still more cruel."

"Robbers! girl, sayest thou" answered her father with a bitter laugh, and what shall they gain from me, think ye? Is there ought in this wornout gaberdine to tempt them? Go to, Adele! I am not now Count Gaspar de Marcanville, the friend of the royal Francis, and a Knight of the Holy Ghost; but plain Hubert, the Hunter of the Limousin; and wolves, thou trowest, will not prey upon wolves."

"But, my dear father," said Adele, embracing him, "I would that thou would'st seek a safer occupation nearer to our dwelling, for I would be by your side."

"What would'st have me to do, girl?" interrupted Gaspar impatiently; would'st have me put this hand to the, sickle or the plough, which has so often grasped a sword in the battle, and a banner-lance in the tournament? or shall a companion of Le Saint-Esprit become a fellow-handworker with the low artizans of this miserable town? I tell thee, Adele, that but for thy sake I would never again quit the forest, but would remain there in a savage life, till I forgot my language and

my species, and became a Wehr-wolf, or a wild-buck!"

Such was commonly the close of their conversation; for if Ådele dared to press her entreaties farther, Gaspar, half frenzied, would not fail to call to her mind all the unhappy circumstances of his fall, and work himself almost to madness by their repetition. He had, in early life, been introduced by the Count De Saintefleur to the Court of Francis I., where he had risen so high in the favour of his sovereign, that he was continually in his society; and in the many wars which so embittered the reign of that excellent monarch, De Marcanville's station was ever by his side. In these conflicts, Gaspar's bosom had often been the shield of Francis, even in moments of the most imminent danger; and the grateful King as often showered upon his deliverer those rewards, which, to the valiant and high-minded soldier, are far dearer than riches-the glittering jewels of knighthood, and the golden coronal of the peerage. To that friend who nad fixed his feet so loftily and securely in the slippery paths of a Court, Gaspar felt all the ardour of youthful gratitude; and yet he sometimes imagined, that he could perceive an abatement in the favour of De Saintefleur, as that of Francis increased. The truth was, that the gold and rich promises of the King's great enemy the Emperor Charles V., had induced De Saintefleur to swerve from his allegiance; and he now waited but for a convenient season to put the darkest designs in practice against his sovereign. He also felt no slight degree of envy, even against that very person whom he had been the instrument of raising; and at length an opportunity occurred, when he might gratify both his ambition and his revenge by the same blow. It was in one of those long wars in which the French Monarch was engaged, and in which De Sainte fleur and De Marcanville were his most constant companions, that they were both watching near his couch while he slept, when the former, in a low tone of voice, thus began to sound the faith of the latter towards his royal master.