for 320 mulwells. FISH AND FISH PIES IN LENT. The cooks had many ways of preparing the fish. Herring-pies were considered as delicacies even by royalty. The town of Yarmouth, by ancient charter, was bound to send a hundred herrings, baked in twenty-four pies or pasties, annually to the king; and Eustace de Corson, Thomas de Berkedich, and Robert de Withen, in the reign of Edward I., held thirty acres by tenure of supplying twenty-four pasties of fresh herrings, for the king's use, on their first coming into season. appellation of Mrs Midnight's Animal Comedians. Fifty marks for five lasts (9,000) red herrings, twelve With incredible labour and patience, a number pounds for two lasts of white herrings, six pounds of dogs and monkeys had been trained to go for two barrels of sturgeon, twenty-one pounds five through certain scenic representations, which shillings for 1300 stock-fish, thirteen shillings and were generally acknowledged to be a marvel-ninepence for eighty-nine congers, and twenty marks lously good imitation of the doings of human actors. The performance took place in a small theatre, which was fitted up with appropriate scenery, decorations, &c., and was, we believe, well attended. A representation of the stage as it appeared from the pit, is reproduced on the preceding page from a contemporary print, in which, however, there are compartments exhibiting other performances by the animal comedians. Taking these compartments as evidence on the subject, we find that there was a Monkeys' Entertainment, two of these animals being seated in full dress at a table with wine and cake, while another of the same species attended with a plate under his arm. Two dogs, accoutred like soldiers, shewed their agility by jumping over a succession of bundles of sticks. Three personated Harlequin, Pero (?), and Columbine, the last attired in a prodigious hoop. Two monkeys, in cloaks and cocked hats, were exercised upon the backs of a couple of dogs. Another monkey, mounted on dog-back, went through a series of quasi-equestrian performances, mounting and dismounting with the greatest propriety. There was also a grand Ballet Dance of dogs and monkeys in the formal dresses of the period, powdered hair, &c., and of this we have caused a copy to be prepared (p. 293). In the original a lady has just been brought in in a sedan. Certainly, however, the principal performance was a Siege, of which also a copy here appears. The stage in this instance presented the exterior of a fortified town. Monkeys manned the walls, and fired at a multitude of canine besiegers. The army of dogs, under their brave commanders, came forward with unflinching courage, and, a couple of ladders being planted, they mounted the ramparts with the greatest agility, and entered the city sword in hand, disregarding such casualties as the fall of two or three of the storming party into the ditch. The simial defenders, as we may suppose, gave a determined resistance; but all was in vain against canine courage, and soon the flag of the assailants waved upon the battlements. When the smoke cleared away, the besieged and besiegers were observed in friendly union on the top of the fore-wall, taking off their hats to the tune of God save the King, and humbly saluting the audience. Tradition intimates to us that Mrs Midnight's Animal Comedians were for a season in great favour in London; yet, strange to say, there is no notice of them in the Gentle man's Magazine, or any other chronicle of the time which we have been able to consult. FISH AND FISH PIES IN LENT. The strictness with which our ancestors observed Lent and fast-days led to a prodigious consumption of fish by all classes; and great quantities are entered in ancient household accounts as having been bought for family use. In the 31st year of the reign of Edward III., the following sums were paid from the Exchequer for fish supplied to the royal household : Lampreys were the favourite dish of the medieval epicures; they were always considered a great delicacy. So great was the demand for this fish in the reign of King John, as to have induced that monarch to issue a royal licence to one Sampson, to go to Nantes to purchase lampreys for the use of the Countess of Blois. The same king issued a mandate to the sheriffs of Gloucester (that city being famous for producing lampreys), forbidding them, on their first coming in, to be sold for more than two shillings a piece. In the reign of Edward III., they were sometimes sold for eightpence or tenpence a piece, and they often produced a much higher price. In 1341, Walter Dastyn, sheriff of Gloucester, received the sum of £12, 58. 8d. for forty-four lampreys supplied for the king's use.'* The corporation of Gloucester presented to the sovereign every Christmas, as a token of their loyalty, a lamprey-pie, which was sometimes a costly gift, as lampreys at that season could scarcely be procured at a guinea a piece. (See Fish, how to choose, how to dress. Printed at Launceston.) The Severn is noted from its lampreys, and Gloucester noted for its peculiar mode of stewing them; indeed, a Gloucester lamprey will almost excuse the royal excess of Henry I., who died at Rouen, of an illness brought on by eating too freely of this choice fish, after a day spent in hunting. In addition to these favourite dishes, the choice vianders' of the fourteenth century paid epicurean prices for delicious morsels of the whale, the porpoise, the grampus, and the sea-wolf. These animals, being then considered as fish, were held as allowable food in Lent it is lamentable to think how much sin they thus occasioned among our forefathers, before they were discovered to be mammalian. The flesh of the porpoise was cooked in various ways: a manuscript in the British Museum contains a receipt for making puddynge of porpoise' (Harl. MSS., No. 279); and we find it served at table as late as the time of Henry VIII., and in the north to a later period. Use of Militia Drilling and Tactics.-Gibbon, who at one part of his life was a captain in the Hampshire regiment of militia, remained ever after sensible of a benefit from it. He says, 'It made me an Englishman and a soldier. In this peaceful service I imbibed the rudiments of the language and science of tactics, which opened a new field of study and observation. The discipline and evolutions of a modern battalion gave me a clearer notion of the phalanx and the legion; and the captain of the Hampshire grenathe historian of the Roman empire.'--Miscellaneous diers (the reader may smile) has not been useless to Works, vol. i., p. 136. * Parker's Domestic Architecture in England, 14th cent., p. 131. WILLIAM LILY. FEBRUARY 25. THE BOOK OF DAYS. St Victorinus, and six companions, martyrs, 284. St Cæsarius, physician of Constantinople, 369. St Walburge, virgin, of England, 779. St Tarasius, patriarch of Constantinople, 806. Born.-Germain de Saint Foix, 1703, Rennes. Died.-William Lilly, master of St Paul's School, London, 1523; Robert Earl of Essex, beheaded, 1600; Count Wallenstein, commander, assassinated, 1634, Eger; Frede rick I. (of Prussia), 1713; Sir Christopher Wren, architect, 1723, St James's; Dr William Buchan, 1805, St Pancras; George Don, naturalist, 1856. WILLIAM LILY, THE GRAMMARIAN. This famous schoolmaster, the friend of Erasmus and Sir Thomas More, was born at Odiham, Hants, about 1468; he was educated at Oxford University, and then travelled to the East, to acquire a knowledge of the Greek language. On his return to England he set up a private grammar-school, and was the first teacher of Greek in the metropolis. In 1512, Dean Colet, who had just founded St Paul's School, appointed Lily the first master. In the following year he produced his Grammar, which has probably passed through more editions than any work of its kind, and is used to this day in St Paul's School; the English rudiments were written by Colet, and the preface to the first edition by Cardinal Wolsey; the Latin syntax chiefly by Erasmus; and the remainder by Lily; the book being thus the joint production of four of the greatest scholars of the age. Lily held the mastership of St Paul's School for nearly twelve years; he died of the plague in London, and was buried in the north churchyard of St Paul's, within bow-shot of the school to whose early celebrity he had so essentially contributed. COUNT WALLENSTEIN. There is scarcely a personage in history of more awe-striking character than Count Wallenstein, the commander of the Emperor's armies in that struggle with Protestantism, the Thirty Years' War. Born of high rank in 1583, Wallenstein found himself at forty chief of the imperial armies, and the possessor of immense wealth. Concentrating a powerful mind on one object, the gratification of his ambition, he attained it to a remarkable degree, and was for some time beyond doubt the greatest subject in Europe. In managing troops by a merciless discipline, in making rapid marches, in the fiery energy of his attacks upon the he was unrivalled. In but one battle, that of Lutzen, where he met the Protestant army under Gustavus of Sweden, was he unsuccessful. enemy, The personality and habits of the man have been strikingly described by Michiels in his History of the Austrian Government. 'Wallenstein's immense riches, his profound reserve, and theatrical manners, were the principal means he employed to exalt the imagination of the masses. He always appeared in public surrounded by extraordinary pomp, and allowed all those attached to his house to share in his luxury. His officers COUNT WALLENSTEIN. lived sumptuously at his table, where never less than one hundred dishes were served. As he rewarded with excessive liberality, not only the multitude but the greatest personages were dazzled by this Asiatic splendour. Six gates gave entrance to his palace at Prague, to make room for which he had pulled down one hundred houses. Similar châteaux were erected by his orders on all his numerous estates. Twentyfour chamberlains, sprung from the most noble families, disputed the honour of serving him, and some sent back the golden key, emblem of their grade, to the Emperor, in order that they might wait on Wallenstein. He educated sixty pages, dressed in blue velvet and gold, to whom he gave the first masters; fifty trabants guarded his antechamber night and day; six barons and the same number of chevaliers were constantly within call His maître-d'hôtel was a to bear his orders. A thousand persons person of distinction. usually formed his household, and about one thousand horses filled his stables, where they fed from marble mangers. When he set out on his travels, a hundred carriages, drawn by four or six horses, conveyed his servants and baggage; sixty carriages and fifty led horses carried the people of his suite; ten trumpeters with silver bugles preceded the procession. The richness of his liveries, the pomp of his equipages, and the decoration of his apartments, were in harmony with all the rest. In a hall of his palace at Prague he had himself painted in a triumphal car, with a wreath of laurels round his head, and a star above him. His 'Wallenstein's appearance was enough in itself to inspire fear and respect. His tall thin figure, his haughty attitude, the stern expression of his pale face, his wide forehead, that seemed formed to command, his black hair, close-shorn and harsh, his little dark eyes, in which the flame of authority shone, his haughty and suspicious look, his thick moustaches and tufted beard, produced, at the first glance, a startling sensation. usual dress consisted of a justaucorps of elk skin, covered by a white doublet and cloak; round his neck he wore a Spanish ruff; in his hat fluttered a large red plume, while scarlet pantaloons and boots of Cordova leather, carefully padded on account of the gout, completed his ordinary attire. While his army devoted itself to pleasure, the deepest silence reigned around the general. He could not endure the rumbling of carts, loud conversations, or even simple sounds. One of his chamberlains was hanged for waking him without orders, and an officer secretly put to death because his spurs had clanked when he came to the general. servants glided about the rooms like phantoms, and a dozen patrols incessantly moved round his tent or palace to maintain perpetual tranquillity. Chains were also stretched across the streets, in order to guard him against any sound. Wallenstein was ever absorbed in himself, ever engaged with his plans and designs. He was never seen to smile, and his pride rendered him inaccessible to sensual pleasures. His only fanaticism was ambition. This strange chief meditated and acted incessantly, only taking counsel of himself, and disdaining strange advice His and inspirations. When he gave any orders or explanations, he could not bear to be looked at curiously; when he crossed the camp, the soldiers were obliged to pretend that they did not see him. Yet they experienced an involuntary shudder when they saw him pass like a supernatural being. There was something about him mysterious, solemn, and awe-inspiring. He walked alone, surrounded by this magic influence, like a saddening halo.' The end of Wallenstein was such as might have been anticipated. Becoming too formidable for a subject, he was denounced to the Emperor by Piccolomini, who obtained a commission to take the great general dead or alive. On the 25th of February 1634, he was assailed in the Castle of Eger by a band, in which were included one Gordon, a Scotsman, and one Butler, an Irishman, and fell under a single stroke of a partizan, dying in proud silence, as he had lived. DEATH OF SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN. Wren's long and useful life, although protracted by activity and temperance much beyond the usual term of man's existence, was brought to a close by an accident. After his dismissal from the office of Surveyor-General, he occupied a town residence in St James's-street, Piccadilly, and continued to superintend the repairs of Westminster Abbey. He also rented from the Crown a house at Hampton Court, where he often retired, and there he passed the greater part of the last five years of his life in study and contemplation. On his last journey from Hampton Court to London, he contracted a cold, which accelerated his death. The good old man had, in his latter days, accustomed himself to sleep a short time after his dinner, and on the 25th of February 1723, his servant, thinking his master had slept longer than usual, went into his room, and found him dead in his chair. He was in his ninety-first year. The funeral of Wren was attended by an assemblage of honourable and distinguished personages, from his house in St James's-street to St Paul's Cathedral, where his remains were deposited in the crypt, adjoining to others of his family, in the recess of the south-eastern window, under the choir. His grave is covered with a black marble slab, with a short inscription in English; and on the western jamb of the window recess is a handsome tablet, with a Latin inscription written by the architect's son, Christopher, in which are the words, Lector, si monumentum quæris, circumspice,' which instruction, to 'look around,' has led to the conclusion that the tablet was intended for the body of the cathedral, where the public might read it. It is understood that the malice of the commissioners for rebuilding St Paul's pursued Wren beyond the grave, and condemned the explanatory epitaph to the crypt, where it could be read but by comparatively few persons. Many years afterwards, Mr Robert Mylne, architect, had a copy of the inscription placed over the marble screen to the choir, which has since been removed. Wren adorned London with no fewer than forty public buildings, but was the worst paid architect of whom we have any record: his DR BUCHAN. annual salary as architect of St Paul's was £200; and his pay for rebuilding the churches in the city was only £100 a year. DR BUCHAN AND HIS 'DOMESTIC MEDICINE.' Who has not heard of Buchan's Domestic Medicine, the medical Mentor, 'the guide, philosopher, and friend' of past generations, and scarcely yet superseded by Graham and Macaulay? This book, bearing on its title-page the epigraph, The knowledge of a disease is half its cure,' a sort of temptation to the reading of medical books in general, first appeared in 1769: it speedily obtained popularity by the plain and familiar style in which it is written; and no less than nineteen editions of the book, amounting to 80,000 copies, were sold during the author's life-time. Dr Buchan, who was born in Roxburghshire, in 1729, long enjoyed a good London practice as a physician. He lived many years at the house of his son, Dr Alexander Buchan, No. 6, Percystreet, Bedford-square; and there he died, at the age of seventy-six: he was buried in the west cloister of Westminster Abbey church. It was Buchan's practice to see patients at the Chapter Coffee-house, in Paternoster-row, where he usually might be found in the Wittenagemot,' a box in the north-east corner of the coffee-room. Though he was a high Tory, he heard the political discussions of the place with good humour, and commonly acted as a moderator, an office for which his fine physiognomy, and his venerable white hairs, highly qualified him. His son belonged to the same club or set, and though somewhat dogmatical, added to the variety and intelligence of the discussions, which, from the mixture of the company, were as various as the contents of a newspaper. Of this same Wittenagemot Dr George Fordyce and Dr Gower were also members; and it was very amusing to hear them in familiar chat with Dr Buchan. On subjects of medicine they seldom agreed, and when such were started, they generally laughed at one another's opinions. They liberally patronised Chapter punch, which always bore a high reputation in London. If any one complained of being indisposed, Buchan would exclaim, Now, let me prescribe for you. Here, John or Isaac, bring a glass of punch for Mrunless he likes brandy-and-water better. that, sir, and I'll warrant you'll soon be wellyou're a peg too low, you want stimulus; and if one glass won't do, call for a second.' Take The Domestic Medicine was written in Sheffield; and James Montgomery, in his Memoirs, relates the following particulars of the author: I remember seeing the old gentleman when I first went to London. He was of venerable aspect, neat in his dress, his hair tied behind with a large black ribbon, and a gold-headed cane in his hand, quite realizing my idea of an Esculapian dignitary.' Montgomery acknowledges that he never spoke to the Doctor, as he was quite out of his reach; but he looked upon him with respect, as a man who had published a book. In one of the Scottish editions of Buchan, there was an astounding misprint, in which a prescription containing one hundred ounces of laudanum, instead of that number of drops, is recommended.' In no other science does Pope's maxim that 'a little learning is a dangerous thing' hold so strongly as in medicine; for those who read medical works, professing to be popular, are almost certain to suppose themselves affected with every disease about which they read. They forthwith take alarm at the probable consequences, and having some lurking suspicion that they may have mistaken the symptoms, they follow the prescriptions laid down in their book in secret, lest they should bring themselves into open ridicule. Goethe shrewdly remarks: He who studies his body too much becomes diseased -his mind, becomes mad;' and there is an old Italian epitaph which, with a little amendment, would run thus: 'I was well-I wished to be better-read medical books-took medicine-and died.' DR KITCHINER. in the King's message, Mr. P. Yorke notes in his Parliamentary Journal: 1744, February 13. Talking upon this subject with Horace Walpole, he told me confidently that Admiral Matthews intercepted last summer a felucca in her passage from Toulon to Genoa, on board of which were found several papers of great consequence, relating to a French invasion in concert with the Jacobites; one of them particularly was in the style of an invitation from several of the nobility and gentry of England to the Pretender. These papers, he thought, had not been sufficiently looked into, and were not laid before the cabinet council until the night before the message was sent to both Houses.' The invasion designed in 1744 did not take place, but in the next year the young Pretender, as is well known, came with only seven men, and nearly overturned the government. INVASION PANIC. TIME-DAY-AND NIGHT. BY GEOFFREY WHITNEY, 1589. And never cease continual course to make, And leave us not, but follow from our birth, FEBRUARY 26. Born.-Anthony Cooper, Earl of Shaftesbury, 1671 Exeter House; Rev. James Hervey, author of Meditations, 1714, Hardingstone; François J. D. Arago, natural philosopher, 1786; Victor Hugo, fictitious writer, 1802. Towards the close of February 1744, the threatened invasion of England by the French, accompanied by the young Pretender, caused a general alarm throughout the kingdom, and all Roman Catholics were prohibited from appearing within ten miles of London. We had then three ships in the Downs; but the landing was expected to be in Essex or Suffolk. Walpole writes from the House of Commons, February 16th: We have come nearer to a crisis than I expected! After the various reports about the Brest squadron, it has proved that they are sixteen ships of the line off Torbay; in all proba bility to draw our fleet from Dunkirk, where they have two men-of-war, and sixteen large Indiamen to transport eight thousand foot and St Alexander, patriarch of Alexandria, 326. St Partwo thousand horse which are there in the town.phyrius, bishop of Gaza, 420. St Victor, of Champagne, There has been some difficulty to persuade the 7th century. people of the imminence of our danger; but yesterday the King sent a message to both Houses to acquaint us that he has certain information of the young Pretender being in France, and of the designed invasion from thence, in concert with the disaffected here.' Immediately addresses were moved to assure the King of standing by him with lives and fortunes. All the troops were sent for, in the greatest haste, to London; and an express to Holland to demand six thousand men. On the 23rd, Walpole writes: There is no doubt of the invasion: the young Pretender is at Calais, and the Count de Saxe is to command the embarkation. Sir John Norris was to sail yesterday to Dunkirk, to try to burn their transports; we are in the utmost expectation of the news. The Brest squadron was yesterday on the coast of Sussex. On'the 25th of February, the English Channel fleet under Sir John Norris came within a league of the Brest squadron. Walpole says the coasts were covered with people to see the engagement; but at seven in the evening the wind changed, and the French fleet escaped. A violent storm shattered and wrecked the transports, and the expedition was glad to put back to Dunkirk. The dread of the invasion was then at an end. With regard to the disaffected' mentioned Died.-Manfred (of Tarento), killed, 1266; Robert Fabian, chronicler, 1513, Cornhill; Sir Nicholas Crispe, Guinea trader, 1665, Hammersmith; Thomas D'Urfey, wit and poet, 1723, St James's; Maximilian (of Bavaria), 1726, Munich; Joseph Tartiné, musical composer, 1770, Padua; Dr Alexander Geddes, theologian, 1802, Padwilliam Kitchiner, littérateur, 1827, St Pancras; Sir dington; John Philip Kemble, actor, 1823, Lausanne; Dr William Allan, R.A., painter, 1850; Thomas Moore, lyric poet, 1852; Thomas Tooke, author of the History of Prices, &c., 1858, London. ECCENTRICITIES OF DR KITCHINER. Eccentricity in cookery-books is by no means peculiar to our time. We have all read of the oddities of Mrs Glasse's instructions; and most olden cookery-books savour of such humour, not to mention as oddities the receipts for doing outof-the-way things, such as 'How to Roast a Pound of Butter,' which we find in the Art of Cookery, by a lady, 1748. To the humour of Dr Kitchiner in this way we doubtless owe a very good book -his Cook's Oracle, in which the instructions are given with so much come-and-read-me pleasantry and gossiping_anecdote as to win the dullest reader. But Kitchiner was not a mere bookmaking cook: he practised what he taught, and he had ample means for the purpose.. From his father, a coal-merchant in an extensive way of business in the Strand, he had inherited a fortune of £60,000 or £70,000, which was more than sufficient to enable him to work out his ideal of life. His heart overflowed with benevolence and good humour, and no man better understood the art of making his friends happy. He shewed equal tact in his books: his Cook's Oracle is full of common-sense practice; and lest his reader should stray into excess, he wrote The Art of Invigorating and Prolonging Life, and a more useful book in times when railways were not-The Traveller's Oracle, and Horse and Carriage Keeper's Guide. With his ample fortune, Kitchiner was still an economist, and wrote a Housekeeper's Ledger, and a coaxing volume entitled The Pleasures of Making a Will. He also wrote on astronomy, telescopes, and spectacles. In music he was a proficient; and in 1820, at the coronation of George IV., he published a collection of the National Songs of Great Britain, a folio volume, with a splendid dedication plate to His Majesty. Next he edited The Sea Songs of Charles Dibdin. But, merrily and wisely as Kitchiner professed to live, he had scarcely reached his fiftieth year when he was taken from the circle of friends. At this time he resided at No. 43, Warrenstreet, Fitzroy-square. On the 26th of February he joined a large dinner-party given by Mr Braham, the celebrated singer : he had been in high spirits, and had enjoyed the company to a later hour than his usually early habits allowed. Mathews was present, and rehearsed a portion of a new comic entertainment, which induced Kitchiner to amuse the party with some of his whimsical reasons for inventing odd things, and giving them odd names. He returned home, was suddenly taken ill, and in an hour he was no more! Though always an epicure, and fond of experiments in cookery, and exceedingly particular in the choice of his viands, and in their mode of preparation for the table, Kitchiner was regular, and even abstemious, in his general habits. His dinners were cooked according to his own method; he dined at five; supper was The Doctor's father was a Roman Catholic, and in the riots of 1780, Beaufort-buildings, in the Strand, were filled with soldiers to protect Kitchiner's coal-wharf in the rear of the buildings by the river-side. DR KITCHINER. served at half-past nine; and at eleven he retired. Every Tuesday evening he gave a conversazione, at which he delighted to bring together professors and amateurs of the sciences and the polite arts. For the regulation of the party the Doctor had a placard over his drawing-room chimney-piece, inscribed Come at seven, go at eleven." is said that George Colman the younger, being introduced to Kitchiner on one of his evenings, and reading this admonition, found an opportunity to insert in the placard after 'go' the pronoun it,' which, it must be admitted, materially WILLIAM KITCHINER, M.D. It altered the reading. In these social meetings, when the Doctor's servant gave the signal for supper, those who objected to take other than tea or coffee departed; and those who remained descended to the dining-room, to partake of his friendly fare. A cold joint, a lobster salad, and some little entremets, usually formed the summer repast; in winter some nicely-cooked hot dishes were set upon the board, with wine, liqueurs, and ales from a well-stocked cellar. Such |