Imatges de pàgina
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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 earth, to flower about his walls or windows in monthly succession, are nothing 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 pot. 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 dissemina tion, 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 cf nature this month is dissemination or ve getable 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,
The night and its dreams are fled,

And the glorious roll of nature now
Is in all its brightness spread.

The autumn has tinged the trees with gold,
And crimson'd the shrubs of the hills;

And the full seed sleeps in earth's bosom cold;
And hope all the universe fills.

Bouring.

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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, 1769.

chorus, called the nine quoires of holy angels;" and he ranks them thus:1. The order of seraphims. 2. The order of cherubims. 3. The order of archangels. 4. The order of angels. 5. The order of thrones. 6. The order of principalities 7. The order of powers. 8. The order of dominions. 9. The order of virtues.

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; will have his synagogue." The latter part for where God hath his church, the devil of this affirmation is versified by honest Daniel De Foe. He begins his "Trueborn Englishman” with it :

Wherever God erects a house of prayer
The devil's sure to have a chapel there.

Angel, in its primitive sense, denotes a messenger, and frequently signifies men, when, from the common notion of the term, it is conceived to denote ministergences, have been the objects of over ing spirits. Angels, as celestial intellicurious inquiry, and of worship. Paul prohibits this: "Let no man," he says,

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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

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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 plea santly 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." Father Henriques was a Jesuit, and communicates this information in a book entitled, "The Business of the Saints in Heaven," published by the written authority of Father Prado, the Provincial of the order of Jesuits at Castille, dated at Salamanca, April 28th, 1631.*

*Moral Practice of the Jesuits. Lond. 12mo. 1670.

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Hannah Want.

"For Age and Want save while you may; No morning sun lasts a whole day."

Want, at Ditchingham, Norfolk, in the

The Times and other journals report the "obit" of this female. "On the 106th 2nd of October, 1825, died Mrs. Hannah

year

of her

age.

She was born on

the 20th of August, 1720, and through

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, 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 winter; 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."

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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 -as if thinking was but an idle waste 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 cast of 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.

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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.

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I always lov'd thee, and thy yellow garb,
October dear!—and I have hailed thy reign,
On many a lovely, many a distant plain,
But here, thou claim'st my warmest best regard.
Not e'en the noble banks of silver Seine

Can rival Derwent's-where proud Chatsworth's tow'rs
Reflect Sol's setting rays-as now yon chain

Of gold-tipp'd mountains crown her lawns and bowers.
Here, countless beauties catch the ravish'd view,
Majestic scenes, all silent as the tomb;

Save where the murmuring of Derwent's wave,
To tenderest feelings the rapt soul subdue,

While shadowy forms seem gliding through the gloom To visit those again they lov'd this side the grave.

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HYDE-PARK-CORNER TOLL-GATE.

Before the close of the sessions of parliament in 1825 an act passed for the removal of the toll-gate at Hyde-park-corner, with a view to the free passage of horsemen and carriages between London and Pimlico. So great an accommodation to the inhabitants of that suburb, manifests a disposition to relieve other growing neighbourhoods of the metropolis from these vexatious imposts. On the present occasion a gentleman, evidently an artist, presented the Editor with a drawing of Hyde-park-corner gate on the day when it was sold; it is engraved opposite. This liberal communication was accompanied by the subjoined letter :— To the Editor of the Every-Day Book. Sir,

I have taken the liberty of enclosing you a representation of a scene which took place at Hyde-park-corner last Tuesday, October 4th, being no less than the

Rickman.

public sale of the toll-house, and all the materials enumerated in the accompany. ing catalogue. If you were not present, the drawing I have sent may interest you

as a view of the old toll-house and the last scene of its eventful history. You are at liberty to make what use of it you please. The sale commenced at one o'clock, the auctioneer stood under the arch before the door of the house on the

north side of Piccadilly. Several carriage folks and equestrians, unconscious of the removal of the toll, stopped to pay, whilst the drivers of others passed through knowingly, with a look of satisfaction at their liberation from the accustomed remantled house without a turnpike mah, striction at that place. The poor disseemed "almost afraid to know itself""Othello's occupation was gone." By this time, if the conditions of the auction have been attended to, not a vestige is event would interest a mind like yours, left on the spot. I have thought this which permits not any change in the bistory of improvement, or of places full of old associations, to take place without I remain, sir, Yours, &c.

record.

A CONSTANT READER

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