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lie quiet, and hush, as he was getting a needle and silken thread ready to sew it up; ordering me to get a bason and water ready, to wash the puir lad's physog. I did so as hard as I was able, though I was na sure aboot the bluid just; auld Dr Gripes watching ower my shouther, wi' a lighted penny candle in ae hand, and the needle and thread in the other, to see where the bluid spouted frae. But we were as daft as wise; so he bade me tak my big sheers, and cut out a the hair on the fore part of the head as bare as my loof; and syne we washed, and better washed; so Magneesy got the ither ee up, when the barkened bluid was loosed, looking, though as pale as a clean shirt, mair frighted than hurt; until it became as plain as pease to us all, first to the Doctor syne to me, and syne to Tammy Bodkin, and last of a to Magneesy himsell, that his skin was na sa much as peeled; so we helped him out of the bed, and blithe was I to see the lad standing on the floor, without a haud, on his ain feet.

I did my best to clean his neckcloth and sark-neck of the bluid, making him look as dacentish as possible, considering circumstances; and lending him, as the Scripture commands, my tartan maud to hide the infirmity of his bluidy breeks and waistcoat; hame gaed he and his maister thegither, me standing at our closs mouth, wishing them a guid morning, and blithe to see their backs. Indeed, a

condemned thief with the rope about his neck, and the white cowl tied ower his een, to say naething of his hands jerked thegither behind his back, and on the nick of being thrown ower, couldna have been mair thankfu for a reprieve than I was, at that same blessed moment. It was like Adam seeing the deil's rear marching out o' Paradise, if ane may be allowed to think sic a thing.

The haill business, tag, rag, and bob-tail, soon, however, spunkit out, and was the town talk for mair than ae day. But ye'll hear.

At the first I pitied the puir lads, that I thocht had fled for ever and aye from their native country, to Bengal, Seringapatam, Botany Bay, or Jamaica; leaving behint them all their friends and auld Scotland, as they might never hear o' the gudeness of Providence in their behalf. Butwait a wee.

Wad ye believe it? As sure's death, the haill was but a wicked trick played by that mischievous loon Blister and his cronies, upon ane that was a simple and saft-headed callant. Deil a haet was in the ae pistol but a pluff o' pouther; and, in the ither, a cartridge paper fu' o' bull's blood was rammed down upon the charge, the which, hitting Magneesy on the eebree, had caused a business, that seemed to have putten him out o' life, and nearly pat me (though ane of the volunteers) out of my seven senses.

CHRISTMAS GIFTS.

WHEN four young maidens, all beautiful as angels, come floating in, wreathed arm in arm, beneath the high-arched door of a drawing-room, where you are sitting on an Ottoman in romantic reverie, how starts the dreamer to his feet at the instantaneous Apparition! The effect, at first, is as of a single overpowering countenance-a combination of the four into one-the magic of a mysterious Monad. Eyes, noses, cheeks, lips breathe love and delight, smiles and kisses

*

even as if the garland were but one flower, the galaxy but one star. It is but one fair cloud illuminated by the sunlight-a holy glee of four voices, but one harmony! Christopher North supports himself on his crutch, and bends down before the undistinguishable glory. His senses, his imagination, his reason are bewildered-all is bright dazzling confusion before the old man's eyes-and you may count the very beatings of his heart. As the divine rustling of silks and satins ap

1. Literary Souvenir; or, Cabinet of Poetry and Romance. Edited by Alaric A. Watts. London. Hurst, Robinson, and Co. 1826.-2. The Amulet; or, Christian and Literary Remembrancer. London. William Baynes and Son. 1826.-3. Forget me Not, a Christmas and New Year's Present for 1826. London. R. Ackermann. 1826.-4. Friendship's Offering; or, a Literary Album. Edited by Thomas K. Hervey. London. Lupton Relfe, 13, Cornhill. 1826.

proaches, he collects his wandering thoughts, and gaping with incipient discrimination, he chuckles to observe that they are not angels-not goddesses, but four young flesh-andblood misses, each in her way prettier than her pretty mamma, a Forgetme-Not, a Friendship's Offering, a Literary Souvenir, a Christian Remembrancer.

Now, we know not how we could better have expressed our satisfaction on beholding the entrée into our Sanctum Sanctorum of these Four Blooming Perennials. They are all jewels -delights-perfect loves. How happy can we be with either-not were the other dear charmer away-but were they merely lying asleep for a season on our capacious table! Sweet creatures! we are in love with you all, nor perhaps would it be gallant to declare a preference. Each becomes Sultana in her turn-according to the movements of that most capricious of all passions custom cannot stale your infinite variety and we swear to be faithful to you during the period of our natural lives, in all the innocent affection of Platonic polygamy.

There was a clever paper in our last Number upon Metaphors, showing, that broken Metaphors (like other bankrupts) always make the best figure. We are availing ourselves of that excellent doctrine, and extending its principle to composition in general. We have spoken first of angels, we think-then of pretty girls-and now, still meaning the same thing, we use the common word, volumes-volumes -twelve shillings, half bound or in boards-embellished with engravings from pictures by the first masters, and the letter-press furnished by forty of the best poets of the age.

Now what is there to hinder a ferocious, shaggy-eye-browed Aristarchus of an editor or contributor to frighten off with a single frown all these four virgin volumes? It cannot be denied that their contents are extremely trifling-not to be weighed for a single moment against the article Steam Engine in any Encyclopædia, or the Stot's Principles of Political Economy. It would be rash to assert that the state of mankind-nay, even of Europe, will be widely, deeply, or permanently affected by the publication of these annual periodicals. In half a century they may even be generally forgot

VOL. XIX.

ten-but who cares, if they are all perused or looked at with pleasure now? Of all prospects, that of the future is surely the most uninteresting. The present for our money, and the more it is embellished the better, for it richly deserves cuts. None but ninnies look into futurity, and what thanks will they get for their pains? Why not a creature born ten years hence will ever so much as condescend to know that they ever existed. Should it so happen that some one of the Paulo-post-futurum gentry should lay his hand on an author who appealed to posterity, can there be a doubt that he will break out into a horse-laugh, and ask if the idiot could have believed in his heart that children were wiser than their fathers? Show us an instance of any respectable gentleman, passing muster as a blockhead all his own lifetime, and imposing on posterity as a firstrate fellow.-No, it won't do.-Once a dunce, always a dunce, If a literary man, a genius, cannot hold up his head above water, but suffers it to be kept under for the short space of twenty minutes, not all the Humane Societies on earth will resuscitate him. We shall suppose that he has been found drowned, and he must be buried under a plain slab. But get a name-a title from your contemporaries, however small, be it even that of Count Tims, and you are immortal.-Tims will be triumphant over Time. Saturn will in vain try to devour him-long after he has made no bones of Wordsworth, and all those other wiseacres who put their trust in posterity.

Where were we? Let us see. Ay, the Literary Souvenir; or, Cabinet of Poetry and Romance, edited by Alaric A. Watts. Six thousand copies, he tells us, of last year's volume have been sold, and we can easily believe it. Our own article upon it could not do less than introduce it into a thousand boudoirs. This year there is no falling off; on the contrary, the tree has come to its full bearing, and the fruit is of brighter hue and richer flavour. That palate would be indeed fastidious that could not relish such a dessert. It is a failing of ours to get drowsy after dinner, especially in the heat of a Christmas fire; but with this awakening volume spread fan-like before our eyes, they retain all their usual lustre throughout the evening. What delici

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ous engravings! Only look at THE LOVERS' QUARREL! Heavens and earth, quarrel with such a bright, breathing, and beautiful bosom ! Where may you seek for calm beneath the skies, if it sleep not between these tranquil billows? There is the luxury of love, hallowed by its innocence a table spread in Paradise, to be deserted for the fare of the common earth!-Or lo! the "Forsaken" smiles faintly at her own credulity, and the evaporation of her lover's sigh! The dream is gone, and the languor of its delight hangs all over the maiden's face and frame. But sorely mistaken indeed art thou, O fair L. E. L., in murmuring for such a Juliet, such a strain as,

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Never was there a more needless waste of sympathetic sorrow; for within three months after she sat to Mr Newton for her picture, did she, the 'Forsaken," elope to Gretna-Green with a particular friend of O'Doherty's, and before the year had expired, was she safely delivered of twins. Notorious facts like these rob fiction of half its pathos; nor is it possible to shed tears over youth and beauty brought to bed under such circumstances. Should L. E. L. introduce into a future Souvenir the "Forsaken" as a widow, let her remember that weeds are mere annuals, and entitle her epithalamium (or, as that accomplished scholar, the late Dr Pirie, would have said, epicedium) "A Year and a Day."

The "Kiss," drawn by J. M. Wright, after Retch, (see his illustrations of Goethe's Faust,) is, if possible, still more charming-fond and impassioned, but perfectly chaste and pure, and not to be gazed on, without delight, by man of woman born. While Lady Louisa Jane Russell, youngest daughter of his Grace the Duke of Bedford, from the statue of Chantry at Woburn Abbey, calms the spirit with a far different image that of childish delight and love as the fair creation stands, unadorned and innocent as an infant, and presses with both gentle hands a dove to her sinless bosom.

But we must turn to the poetry. And here it gives us pleasure to present our readers with one of the very best compositions in the volume, from the pen of the editor :

THE POET'S DEN.

A Sketch on the Spot.

Thus, in this calm retreat, so richly fraught With mental light, and luxury of thought, His life steals on.

ROGERS.

"Tis the "leafy month of June,"
And the pale and placid moon,
In the east her cresset rearing,
Tells that summer's eve is wearing;-
But the sun is lingering still
O'er the old accustom'd hill,
And condenses all his rays

In one broad, attemper'd blaze,-
Twilight's shadows deepening 'round him,
Like a king when foes surround him,
Gathering, since he scorns to fly,
Life's last energies to die!

See the parting god of day
Leaves a trail upon his way,-
Like the memory of the dead
When the sainted soul is fled,-
And it chequers all the skies
With its bright innumerous dyes.
Each into the other flowing,
Waves of clouds, all rich and glowing,

Pierced by many a crimson streak,
Like the blush on Beauty's cheek;
Here and there dark purple tinges
Peering through their saffron fringes,
(Amethysts of price untold,
Set in shrines of virgin gold,)
And, anon, a dewy star,
Twinkling from blue depths afar,
Bright as Woman's tearful eye
When she weeps, she scarce knows why.
Not a sound disturbs the hush,
Save the mountain-torrent's gush,
As it struggles, with a bound,
From the depth of shades profound;
Now through tangled brush-wood stray-
ing,

Now o'er velvet moss delaying,
Lapsing now in parted streams,
Like a youthful poet's dreams,

And, anon, their haven won,
Cooling breezes bathe the brow
Gently gliding into one!
With delicious fragrance now;
Incense sweet from many a bower;
Odours from each closing flower;
Swell upon the rising gale,
On the charmed sense prevail,
Till the pulse forgets to move,
And the soul is drunk with love!"

Where yon sweet clematis flings, Far and wide, its starry rings; Where the graceful jasmine's braid, Makes a green, eye-soothing shade, And their shoots united rove O'er the trelliced roof above,Deep embower'd from mortal ken, Thread we now a Poet's Den !

Bright confusion revels there, Ne'er had she a realm more fair ; 'Tis a wilderness of mind, Redolent of tastes refined. Tomes of wild romantic lore, Cull'd from Fancy's brightest store,(Caskets full of gems sublime, From the silent depths of Time,) Poets, whose conceptions high Are sparks of immortality; Sages, Wisdom's self hath crown'd, People all the walls around; Or beneath the 'wilder'd eye, In "admired disorder" lie Ingots rich of Fancy's ore, Scatter'd o'er the crowded floor.

Mystic scraps are strewn around, Like the oracles profound Of the Delphic prophetess; And as difficult to guess !China vases, filled with flowers, Fresh from evening's dewy bowers; Love-gifts from his lady fair, Knots of ribbon, locks of hair; Sprigs of myrtle, sent to keep Memory from too sound a sleep; Violets, blue as are the eyes That awake his softest sighs, And reward his love-sick lays With their smiles of more than praise; Spells of sweetness, gather'd 'round, Make those precincts hallow'd ground!

Here a broken, stringless lute; There a masker's antic suit; Fencing foils; a Moorish brand; Tokens strange from many a land; Memory's lights to many a scene Where his roving steps have been; Cameos rich, from mighty Rome; Laurel wreathes from Virgil's tomb; Golden fruit from Scio's vine; Views along the winding Rhine; Wither'd shrubs from Castaly, Spread below, or ranged on high, Mingle there promiscuously! And many a fair and sunny face, Many a sculptured shape of grace, Such as Guido's pencil warm'd, And Canova's chisel form'dBrows by deathless genius crown'd,Breathe their inspiration 'round; Like the smile of primal Light, Making even Chaos bright.

By the open lattice sitting, Fever'd streams of beauty flitting O'er his heart, and o'er his brain, In one bright, unbroken chain ; Drinking deep through every sense, Draughts of pleasure, too intense,Mark the poet's glistening eye Wandering now o'er earth and sky!

'Tis a blissful hour to him,-Slave of feeling-child of whim Builder of the lofty rhyme,Bard,-musician,-painter,-mime; Ever sway'd by impulse strong, Each by turns, and nothing long; Fickle as the changing rays Round the sun's descending blaze; Still in search of idle toys; Pining after fancied joys; All that charm'd his heart or eye, Sought-possess'd--and then thrown by! Doom'd on shadows thus to brood, Whilst life's more substantial good, All that wiser bosoms prize, Fades like day from yonder skies!

There is much fancy of thought and elegance of expression in the "Ode to a Steam-Boat," by T. Doubleday, Esq.

ODE TO A STEAM-BOAT.

ON such an eve, perchance, as this,
When not a zephyr skims the deep,
And sea-birds rest upon the abyss,
Scarce by its heaving rocked to sleep,-
On such an eve as this, perchance,
Might Scylla eye the blue expanse.

The languid ocean scarce at all
Amongst the sparkling pebbles hissing—
The lucid wavelets, as they fall,
The sunny beach in whispers kissing,
Leave not a furrow-as they say
Oft haps, when pleasure ebbs away.

Full many a broad but delicate tint
Is spread upon the liquid plain;
Hues rich as aught from fancy's mint,
Enamell'd meads, or golden grain ;-
Flowers submarine, or purple heath,
Are mirror'd from the world beneath.

One tiny star-beam, faintly trembling,
Gems the still waters' tranquil breast;
Mark the dim sparklet, so resembling
Its parent in the shadowing east ;-
It seems so pure, so bright the trace-
As sea and sky had changed their place.

Hush'd is the loud tongue of the deep ;-
Yon glittering sail, far o'er the tide,
Amid its course appears to sleep;
We watch, but only know it glide
Still on, by a bright track afar,
Like genius, or a falling star!

Oh! such an eve in sorrow's balm,
Yon lake the poet's Hippocrene:
And who would ruffle such a calm,
Or cast a cloud o'er such a scene!
'Tis done!-and nature weeps thereat,
Thou boisterous progeny of Watt!

Wast thou a grampus, nay a whale,
Or ork one sees in Ariosto:
Went'st thou by rudder, oar, or sail,
Still would'st thou not so outrage gusto!
But when did gusto ever dream
Of seeing ships propelled by steam?

Now blazing like a dozen comets,
And rushing as if nought could bind thee,
The while thy strange internal vomits
A sooty train of smoke behind thee;
Tearing along the azure vast,
With a great chimney for a mast!

Satan, when scheming to betray us,
He left of old his dark dominions,
And wing'd his murky way through Chaos,
And waved o'er Paradise his pinions;
Whilst Death and Sin came at his back,
Would leave, methinks, just such a track.

Was there no quirk,-one can't tell how,

No stiff-necked flaw-no quiddit latent,

Thou worst of all sea-monsters thou!
That might have undermined thy pa-
tent,

Or kept it in the inventor's desk—
Fell bane of all that's picturesque ?

Should Neptune in his turn invade thee,
And at a pinch old Vulcan fail thee,
The sooty mechanist who made thee
May hold it duty to bewail thee:--
But I shall bring a garland votive,
Thou execrable locomotive !

He must be long-tongued, with a wit-
ness,

Whoe'er shall prove, to my poor notion,
It sorts with universal fitness

To make yon clear, pellucid ocean,
That holds not one polluted drop,
Bear on its breast a blacksmith's shop.

Philosophers may talk of science,
And mechanicians of utility;
In such I have but faint reliance:
To admire thee passeth my ability;

My taste is left at double distance,
At the first sea-quake of thy pistons.

It may be orthodox and wise,
And catholic, and transcendental,
To the useful still to sacrifice,
Without a sigh, the ornamental :
But be it granted me, at least,
That I may never be the priest !

Magazines, newspapers, reviews,
have teemed, do teem, and will teem,
with extracts from Mr Watts's Lite-
rary Souvenir.
We have given these
two poems, both for their own great
merit, and because we have nowhere
seen them quoted. We should sup-
pose there are not fewer than eighty
articles in the volume, in prose and
verse-not many of them below medi-
ocrity-most of them extremely good,
and a few of first-rate excellence. The
volume is indeed everything that it
ought to be in composition and in em-
bellishment.*

The "Amulet, or Christian and Literary Remembrancer," is of a somewhat different character from the others, having more of a religious spirit. The editor explains his views very judiciously in a well-written preface:—

"It has appeared to the publishers of the present volume, that a work which should blend religious instruction with literary amusement was still a desideratum, -for the influence of Religion is always most powerful when she is made to delight those whom it is her office to teach; and many, who would perhaps shun her in the severer garb in which she sometimes appears, may be won to her side by the attractions of a more tasteful attire. The work, however, is to be considered as a religious publication only so far as that every article tends to impress some moral lesson. It depends for its success equally on its literary merits. The nature of the contributions, and the excellence of the embellishments, will sufficiently prove that no expense has been spared to render the volume worthy of the advanced state of literature and the arts.

"It will be at once perceived, that individuals of various religious denominations are among the contributors. This

* But who wrote the story to accompany Newton's Lovers' Quarrel? The Monthly Review is mad, or rather idiotic upon it-lauding it to the skies as if it were absolutely a Tale written by some Great Unknown. Now we pledge our critical character on the truth of the following sentence:-"It is a piece of vile cockney slang, sufficient to turn the stomach of a horse."-C. N.

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