Doct. No truer, than I have seen it. You hear me not deny that all is true, That Mandevil delivers of his travels; let I myself may be as well believed. Per. Since you speak reverently of him, say on. Doct. Of Europe I'll not speak, 'tis too near home; Who's not familiar with the Spanish garb, Th' Italian cringe, French shrug, and German hug? Nor will I trouble you with my observations Tetch'd from Arabia, Paphlagonia, Mesopotamia, Mauritania, yria, Thessalia, Persia, India; ll still is too near home: tho' I have touch'd oo near home to be boasted. They sound ake the reports of those, that beggingly lave put out on returns from Edinburgh, Paris, or Venice; or perhaps Madrid, Whither a Millaner may with half a nose Smell out his way; and is not near so difficult, Lady. What, with their heels upwards? Lady. And yet just under us! Where is Hell then? if they, whose feet are toward us At the lower part of the world, have Heaven too Beyond their heads, where's Hell? Doct. You may find that Without enquiry. Scene, at the Antipodes. N.B. In the Antipodes, every thing goes contrary to our manners: wives rule their husbands; servants govern their masters; old men go to school again,&c. Son. Servant. Gentleman, and Lady, natives. English Traveller. Servant (to his young Master.) How well you saw Your father to school to day, knowing how apt He is to play the truant! Son. But is he not Yet gone to school? Servant. Stand by, and you shall see. Enter three old men with satchels. You shall to school. Away with him; and take 2d old man. You sha'nt send us now, so you sha'nt3d old man. We be none of your father, so we be'ntSon. Away with 'em, I say; and tell their school mistress What truants they are, and bid her pay 'em soundly. All three. Oh, oh, oh ! Lady. Alas! will nobody beg pardon for The poor old boys? English Traveller. Do men of such fair years here go to school? Gentleman. They would die dunces else. Threescore, their sons send them to school again; Son. Tis granted. Hold up your heads, and thank the gentleman, Like scholars, with your heels now. Striker. Huh, huh, huh! so he is the villain's gone, when comfort gone in hopes that he has killed me, my is he has recovered me. I was heart-sick with a co All three. Gratias, gratias, gratias. (excunt singing.) ceit, which lay so mingled with my flegm, that I had [From the "Asparagus Garden," a Comedy, by the same Author, 1634.] Private Conference. Father-in-Law. You'll not assault me in my own house, nor urge me beyond my patience with your borrowing attempts. Spendthrift Knight. I have not used the word of loan or borrowing; Only some private conference I requested. Fath. Private conference! a new-coined word for borrowing of money. I tell you, your very face, your countenance, tho' it be glossed with knighthood, looks so borrowingly, that the best words you give me are as dreadful as Stand and Deliver.-Your riotousness abroad, and her long night-watchings at home, shortened my daughter's days, and cast her into her grave; and 'twas not long before all her estate was buried too.. Spend. I wish my life might have excused Ker's far more precious; never had a man A juster cause to mourn. perished if I had not broke it, and made me spit it out; hem, he is gone, and I'll home merrily. I would not he should know the good he has done me for half my estate; nor would I be at peace with him to save it all. I would not lose his hatred for all the good neighbourhood of the parish. Morley, near Leeds, July, 1827, Sir, On surveying the plays and pas times of children, in these northern parts Fath. Nor mourn'd more justly, it is your only especially, it has often struck me with re wearing; you have just none other; nor have had any ineans to purchase better any time these seven years, I take it; by which means you have got the name of the Mourning Knight. spect to some of them, that if traced up to their origin, they would be found to have been "political satires to ridicule such follies and corruptions of the times, as it Timothy Hoyden, the Yeoman's Son, de- was, perhaps, unsafe to do in any other sires to be made a Gentleman. He consults with his friends. manner." In this conjecture I have lately been confirmed, by meeting with a curious paper, copied from another periodical work Moneylack. Well, Sir, we will take the speediest by a contributor to the old London Maga course with you. Hoyd. But must I bleed? Mon. Yes, you must bleed; your father's blood must out. He was but a Yeoman, was he? zine, vol. for 1738, p. 59. It is an article which many would doubtless be glad to find in the Table Book, and nobody more so than myself, as it would be a capital Hoyd. As rank a Clown (none dispraised) as any in accompaniment to my present remarks. Somersetshire. Mon. His foul rank blood of bacon and pease porritch Must out of you to the last dram Springe. Fear nothing, Sir. Your blood shall be taken out by degrees; and your veins replenished with pure blood still, as you lose the puddle. Hoyd. I was bewitch'd, I think, before I was begot, to have a Clown to my father. Yet my mother said she was a Gentlewoman. Spr. Said what will not women say? Mon. Be content, Sir; here's half a labour saved: you shall bleed but of one side. The Mother vein shall not be pricked. Old Striker, after a quarrelling bout with old Touchwood. Touchwood. I have put him into these fits this forty years, and hope to choke him at last. (aside; and exit.) To come at once to the point; we have, or rather had, a few years ago, a game called the "bear and tenter," (or bear and bear warden, as it would be called in the south,) which seems, certainly, to have been one of the sort alluded to. A boy is made to crawl as a bear upon his hands and knees, round whose neck is tied a rope which the keeper holds at a few yards' dis tance. The bystanders then buffet the bear, who is protected only by his keeper, who, by touching any of the assailants, becomes liberated; the other is then the bear, and the buffeted bear becomes the keeper, and so on. If the "tenter" sluggish or negligent in defence of his charge, it is then that the bear growls, and the blows are turned upon the guardia, wholly or partially, as the bearbaiters elect Now, my conjecture as to the origin of the game of "bear and tenter" is this.Our English youths and their tutors, or companions, were formerly distinguished in foreign countries by the names of the bear and the bear leader, from the absurd custom of sending out the former, (a boisterous, ungovernable set,) and putting them under the care of persons unfit to accompany them. These bears were at first generally sprigs of royalty or nobility, as headstrong as need be; and the tutor was often some needy scholar, a Scotsman, or a courtier, who knew little more of the world than his pupil; but who, when he had put on his bag-wig and sword, was one of the most awkward and ridiculous figures imaginable. While these people were abroad, there can be no doubt that they were for merly the dupes and laughingstocks of those who dealt with them; and that, in exchange for the cash out of which they were cheated, they brought home a stock of exotic follies, sufficient to render them completely preposterous characters in the eyes of their own countrymen. Considering therefore how much good English gold was wasted and lost in these travels, how hurtful to the national pride the practice was, and how altered for the worse were 66 both guardian and ward, it is not to be I am well aware, Mr. Editor, that there was formerly a pastime of buffeting the bear; but that, as I apprehend, was a very different sport from that of " bear and tenter," and had not a political origin. That this had, I am well assured, from the game being kept up in these parts, where the Stuarts were ever almost universally execrated; where patriotism once shone forth in meridian splendour, and the finest soldiers that the world ever saw, were ar- I remain, yours respectfully, GLANCES AT BOOKS ON MY TABLE. FAVELL, in the County of Northamp According to Mr. Cole, Weston Favell is entered in Domesday book as "Westone," and the addition of Favell was derived from a family of that name, who formerly mansions standing there at the commencepossessed the manor. From each of three ment of the last century, but not one of which remained at its close, the important equipage of a "coach and six" formerly issued to the admiration of the villagers. The church is dedicated to St. Peter," and cel, with a coped tower at the west end, conconsists of a body, south porch, and chantaining five bells." Mr. C. remarks, on had once a spire to it, which was many the authority of tradition, that the tower years ago destroyed by lightning; and this observation induces him to cite, by way of note, that "Tradition is a very poetical, a very pleasing personage; we like to meet him in our travels, and always ask him a question. You will find him grey and blind, sitting among old ruins, and Death standing, dim, behind.'' Mr. Cole copies several monumental inscriptions within the church, chiefly in especially on his favourite, viz. :— memory of the Hervey family, and one HERE LIE THE REMAINS OF THE REV. JAMES HERVEY, A. M. THAT VERY PIOUS MAN Herbey's Birth-Place at Hardingston. In this house (the representation of which is derived from Mr. Cole's History of Weston Favell) the author of the "Meditations" first saw light. He was instructed by his mother in reading till the age of seven, and then sent to the free grammar-school at Northampton, where he remained till seventeen, at which age his father placed him at Lincoln college, Oxford, and there he resided seven years, and gained an exhibition of twenty pounds. In 1736 he returned to his father, who was then rector of Weston Favell, and became his curate. In May, 1737, he succeeded the celebrated George Whitefield in the curacy of Dummer, Hampshire, and in about a twelvemonth removed to Stoke Abbey, Devon, where he lived with his friend, Mr. Orchard, upwards of two years. In 1739 he accepted the curacy of Bideford, which he retained till his final settlement at Weston Favell, where he To ampler plenitude and sweeter days It was in Hervey's native parish, Hardingston, that the battle of Northampton was fought on the 10th of July, 1460, and king Henry VI. taken prisoner by the earl of Warwick: the duke of Buckingham, : the earl of Shrewsbury, and other noblemen were killed and many of the slain were buried in the convent of Delapre, and at St. John's hospital, Northampton. In Hardingston parish is a military work, supposed to have been raised by the Danes, and therefore called the Danes' camp. The wake of Weston Favell is held on the next Sunday after St. Peter's day. In the afternoon the rector preaches an appropri ate sermon, the choristers prepare suitable psalms, and throngs of visitants from the neighbouring villages attend the service in the church. During the first three or four days of the feast-week there are dances at the inns, with games at bowls and quoits, and throughout the week there are dinner and tea-parties from the environs, whose meetings usually conclude with a ball. On St. Valentine's day the village lads and lasses assemble, and go round with a wish of "Good morrow, morrow, Valentine!" to the principal inhabitants, who give money to the juvenile minstrels. On Shrove Tuesday, at noon, it is the custom to ring one of the church-bells, called the "Pancake bell;" its sound intimates a holiday and allowance of sport to the village youngsters. The fifth of November is jovially celebrated with a bonfire, which may be viewed throughout a circuit of many miles. Christmas is kept merrily, but the ancient usages of the season have passed away, except the singing by the church-choir, of whose carols Mr. Cole produces three, "which may serve," he says, 66 as an ad dition to Mr. Gilbert's collection." In this "history" there is an engraving of two "figures on bricks, near the pulpit:" the other engravings are from a former work by Mr. Cole, entitled " Herveiana," (2 vols. foolscap 8vo. 1822,) wherein is collected a large number of particulars concerning Hervey from various sources. The latter work enumerates from Hervey's "Theron and Aspasio," the plants of the parish, and agreeably describes the common but beautiful plant, called Cuckoo-pint, or Wake Robin, which abounds under the hedge-rows. It is spoken of by its scientific Arum-a wild herb, which unfolds but one leaf, formed after a very singular pattern, bearing some resemblance to the hare's ear. It is really one of the prettiest fancies in Nature's wardrobe, and is so much admired by the country-people, that they have dignified it with the appellation of lords and ladies; because it looks, suppose, somewhat like a person of quality, sitting with an air of ease and dignity in his open sedan. In autumn, after both flowers have vanished, a spike of scarlet berries, on a simple stalk, is all that remains." name: I On the first publication of Hervey's "Meditations and Contemplations," and for several years afterwards, they were highly popular, and are still greatly admired by young persons, and others who are delighted by a florid interjectional manner of writing. Hervey's work occurs in Mr. Bohn's "Catalogue of the Library of the late reverend and learned Samuel Parr, LL.D." with the following remarkable note attached to the volume-" This book was the delight of Dr. Parr, when he was a boy; and, for some time, was the model on which he endeavoured to form a style." ARUM-CUCKOO-PINT-STARCHWORT. Old John Gerard, who was some time gardener to Cecil lord Burleigh, in the reign of queen Elizabeth, says, in his "Herbal," that "beares, after they have lien in their dens forty dayes without any manner of sustenance, but what they get with licking and sucking their owne feet, do, as soon as they come forth, eate the herbe Cuckoo-pint, through the windie nature whereof the hungry gut is opened, and made fit againe to receive sustenance." Gerard further tells, that "the most pure and white starch is made of the roots of Cuckow-pint; but is most hurtful to the hands of the laundresse that hath the handling of it, for it choppeth, blistereth, and maketh the hands rough and rugged, and withall smarting." From this ancient domestic use of the arum, it was called "Starch-wort:" it bore other and homelier names, some of them displeasing to a modern ear. Gerard likewise relates of the arum, medically, that after being sodden in two or three waters, whereby it may lose its acrimony, and fresh put to, being so eaten, it will cut thick and tough humours in the chest and lungs; "but, then, that Cuckowpint is best that biteth most-but Dragon's is better for the same purpose." I know not whether I have fallen in with the sort of arum " that biteth most," but, a summer or two ago, walking early in the afternoon through the green lanes to Willsden, and so to Harrow on the Hill, its scarlet granulations among the way-side browse and herbage, occasioned me to recollect the former importance of its root to the housewife, and from curiosity I dug up one to taste. The piece I bit off was scarcely the size of half a split pea, yet it gave out so much acrid milk, that, for more than an hour, my lips and tongue were inflamed and continued to burn, as if cauterized by hot iron; nor did the sensation wholly cease till after breakfast the next morning. Gerard says that, according to Dioscorides, "the root hath a peculiar virtue against the gout," by way of cataplasm, blister-wise. Hervey introduces the flower of the Cuckoo-pint as one of the beautiful products of the spring. "The hawthorn in every hedge is partly turgid with silken gems, partly diffused into a milk-white bloom. Not a straggling furze, nor a solitary thicket on the heath, but wears a rural nosegay. Even amidst that neglected dike the arum rises in humble state; most curiously shrouded in her leafy tabernacle, and surrounded with luxuriant families, each distinguished by a peculiar livery of green." I am almost persuaded that I have seen the fruited arum among the ornaments of gothic architecture, surmounting pinnacles of delicate shrine-work. |