bestows on his favourite archery, or Isaac Walton pours forth when descanting on the art of angling.

What Dr. Johnson has so judiciously and so elegantly applied in a dedication to Payne's Treatise on the Game of Draughts, might equally be said of the game of cricket, or even of that of marbles.*

"Triflers," observes the profound critic, " may find or make any thing a trifle; but since it is the characteristic of a wise man to see events in their causes, to obviate consequences, and to ascertain contingencies, your lordship will think nothing a trifle by which the mind is inured to caution, foresight, and circumspection. The same skill, and often the same degree of skill, is exerted in great and in little things.

success.

position seemed, we might, very possibly, be overtaken. The B. men had better try.' But they were beaten sulky, and would not move -to my great disappointment; I wanted to prolong the pleasure of What a glorious sensation it is to be for five hours together winning-winning-winning! always feeling what a whist-player feels when he takes up four honours, seven trumps! Who would think that a little bit of leather, and two pieces of wood, had such a delightful and delighting power?"

* This dedication, under the name of Payne, is "To the Right Honourable William Henry, Earl of Rochford, &c."

It may also be observed that in drawing a parallel between the game of life and that of cricket, there is more aptness of allusion than may at first strike the reader; for in the former, as in the latter game, there is much to do, and much to guard against; and if any runs are made, in the way of speculation, whether of pleasure or of gain, they must be made with caution, skill, and vigour; or the presumptuous adventurer, through some adverse event, will inevitably be bowled out!

BARNARD BATWELL.

DEATH AND THE CAPTIVE.

LIBERTY! Liberty!* thou hast heard
My weary prayer at length,

But the plumeless wing of the captive bird
Is shorn of its buoyant strength;

I am too weary now to roam

Through sun-light and the air,
To bear me to my mountain home,
Or joy if I were there.

Liberty! Liberty! thou hast been
The prayer of my burning heart,
Till the silent thoughts that were within
Into life and form would start;

And, oh! the glorious dreams that roll'd,
Like scenes of things that be

And voices of the night that told—

"The captive and the earth are free!"

*The author, in order, as it would appear, to avoid the almost inevitable monotony of the subject, has represented the Captive as at first mistaking the Vision of the King of Terrors for that of Liberty— the burning passionate hope of the heart, cherished through years of gloom, may well, indeed, be imagined to have this effect in the feverish excitement of struggling nature.-EDITOR.