of these papers Mr. Jesse appears to have seen. Many of them have been published in the volumes of the Duke of Buckingham, Twiss's "Life of Lord Eldon," and books of

that class.

66

"but your Majesty is mistaken as to there being any relationship." The King, not minding him, "And then it is such a good thing lashed on: for his twelve children." This was quite too much for the Premier, and he said, "Bishop Prityman I am certainly most anxious to proThe letters of the King to Lord Wey-mote; but he is not my relative, nor has he mouth, and those to the Howe family, are such a family." "Pho! Pho!" said the King, now first made public. Mrs. Howe, sister it is not Prityman whom I mean, but Sutof Earl Howe, was a great friend of the ton." "I should hope," said Pitt, "that the King's. At her house in Grafton street it talent and literary eminence". It can't was that Franklin used to go and play be, it can't be; I have already wished Sutton chess, and talk over the possibility of a joy, and he must go to Canterbury." Pitt, it reconciliation between the Colonies and seems, was exceedingly angry at having been the mother country. "What are the real overreached by the King. Lord Sidmouth told and substantive grounds of quarrel?" she Dean Milman that he believed such strong language had rarely ever passed between a soverenquired over the game, not without supe- eign and his Minister. rior instructions. No clashing interests," he replied, "it was rather a matter of punctilio, which two or three sensible people might settle in half an hour." The fair diplomatist, who was then in her fifty-fifth year, lived to see the close of the great war that taxed her Royal friend's powers and courage more than any other event of his reign. In 1814, when he was already dead to the world, blind, and imbecile, a living tomb, she died at her house in Grafton street, at the age of ninety-three, having shown to the last "all the spirit and life of a girl, talking, reading, writing, and playing at cards, dressed in powdered hair, triple ruffles, and furbelowed gowns, a fine model of the costume of the whole Court."

Among the many stories which Mr. Jesse has got together, the following account of the King outwitting Pitt is worthy of extract. The succession to the primacy, on the death of Archbishop Moore, was destined by the Prime Minister for Tomline, while the King desired to give it to Manners Sutton, Bishop of Norwich, and Dean of Windsor.

The King received a message from Pitt that Archbishop Moore was dead, and that he would wait upon His Majesty the next morning. The King, suspecting the cause, ordered his horse, and rode over to Bishop Sutton, then residing at Windsor. He found he was at dinner with some friends, and sent in the servant to say a gentleman wished to speak to him. The Bishop said, immediately, he could not go; but something in the servant's manner made him change his determination. When he came out, he found the King standing in a little dress ing-room, near the hall door. The King took him by both hands. My lord Archbishop of Canterbury (he said), I wish you joy. Not a word: go back to your guests." On Pitt's arrival the next day, the King said to him, he was sure he would be glad to have an opportunity of providing for a most deserving friend and relative. "A friend, indeed," said Pitt,

"

An altercation between Pitt and his master must certainly have been a serious matter, and one can hardly help wishing that a full account of the interview had been preserved, as an exhibition of the angry passions at play under difficult circumstances. It would be easy to multiply entertaining extracts, but we prefer sending the reader to the book itself, with which he cannot fail to be amused.

From the London Review.

THE FALL OF THE LEAVES. It was not merely the exigences of rhyme, let us hope, but some subtle sympathy with nature, that prompted the poet, in the severe prophecy he delivers over the victim of sobriety, to liken his fate to that of the leaves of autumn Falls as the leaves do fall falls as the leaves do. fall, and d es in Is there not even a touch of October." pathos in this repetition of the fatal words? It sounds as if the poet felt it his duty to prophecy evil things; but being a man, could not but compassionate the culprit. At the same time a melancholy prospect is set before the impenitent hydrophilist he beholds on every side the circumstances of that death which is to be his own, and thus, as it were, dies a double death. Yet even in this universal aspect of decay, there is a gleam of comfort, if the Italian proverb is true which says that sorrow shared is only half sorrow. In his woe he will have sharers, innumerable as the sands on the sea-shore, for October brings on that

"Cold full strong And weathers gril and derk to sight;"

when, as Chaucer notes, the earth is "in pover estate" and the "birdes have left their song," and the "dry woodes" bereft

The perfume of the woods in autumn has, we think, never been remarked. Every one has noticed the delicious odour of the of their green and gracious ornaments reply ripened apple, pear, and other fruit; and to every wind with melancholy wails. And yet, we venture to say, the incense offered yet, although one instinctively shrinks from up by the ripened leaves (for virtually they observing the painful progress of decay in are such), though more delicate and faint, all things, there is a solemn beauty in au- will not be found less grateful by any wantumn woods which to some minds more than derer in the woodland. Sometimes, on recompensates for the loss of their summer turning from such a ramble, we have known joyousness. Walk forth among their glades persons to be questioned touching that beauwhen the first stray leaves flutter down, one tiful perfume they used the perfume beby one, you might almost fancy there is ing nothing other than the scent of the something tentative and hesitating in the withering leaves. The most striking feature way they descend, going forth on an un- of the autumnal forest is, however, the gorknown path with few companions. And, geous hues in which it is draped. More after all, they are but the weaklings, those than one poet looking on its splendours has whose life was in the shade from their birth, compared them to those of evening, and and who contributed nothing to the general called it "the sunset of the year." So sings beauty, except, perhaps, in the eye of some Aubrey de Vere, who employs a still more over-particular poet. Let them fall. The original but not less suitable image, in a foliage is observed to have become meagre poem recommending Chaucer to the reader, and thin; little heaps of rusty leaves are in spring, in summer, and raked away from beneath the boughs, but the change has in it nothing as yet of splen-"On lonely evenings in dull Novembers, dour. The brooks are loaded with saturat

When streams run choked under skies of lead,

And on forest hearths the year's last embers, Wind-heaped and glowing, lie yellow and red."

Not as yet have the winds altogether heaped up the leafy pyres; we still can admire the trees in their gorgeous raiment. Some of them, indeed, appear almost as if they were enveloped in flames which burned not; pale yellow in these, duskily red in those. How they stand out against the dark background of the pines and evergreens! In glancing over the array of forest, one notices how the outline of the several trees, is

ed leaves; to the slightest semblance of a sunbeam a sanguine bird, here and there, is heard to give a piping welcome and suddenly to relapse into disconsolate silence, as perceiving how transitory was the gleam. Soon the moist warmth of the atmosphere gives place; the skies grow more clear of clouds, and one perceives that it grows chilly apace it is even "cold o' nights." Now, in these drier times, we can detect faint vapours rising from the fields, deepening opaquely in coombes and valleys, and clinging in pallid wreaths around the skirts and among the branches of the woodlands. In less level shires, towards the north, the knolls lift their heads above the low-lying" picked out" in different colours; the mists, like islands above a hazy sea. Looking from one of their summits, you see here and there a tree-top half emerging, like the spars of a stranded ship; and beyond, you perceive a village spire and pointed gables - landmarks, as it were, of a submerged town. All this time nature takes advantage of the vaporous screen which veils the forest to pursue her unrelenting labours. You will see, by-and-by, when the northern breeze has blown the mists away out to sea, that autumn, at least, has discovered the philosopher's stone, and can transmute, at pleasure, whatever she touches into gold. The forest stands forth as a monarch in Tyrean dyes, resplendent in purple, crimson, and gold. There is no room for sadness be fore a spectacle of so much beauty, set off in so many varying hues.

central masses may be still verdant or already bare, but the profile or contour of the branches has its wavy line of gold or crimson. And, on closer examination, it is plain that each tree retains certain individual characters now as at all other times. Even when completely denuded of foliage, with not one leaf left upon it, the observant eye can readily distinguish the genus by the peculiarities of the twigs and branches, their greater or less slightness, number, and the angles they make with the main trunk itself. So also does the colouring of the leaf give some indication of the tree on which it grows. Look at the oak, monarch of our forests, it does not condescend to flaunt in gay and gaudy hues; its foliage gets a hardy, bronzed appearance, like the skin of men who have suf

Enough, however, has been said, we trust, to dissipate the idea that autumnal woods are nought but scenes of mourning and desolation."

From the Examiner.

fered hardships and rough usage from the | after a little, one or two going first, then weather. The close-grained beech, being a others and others following, they supply grade lower, shows itself a degree more the only picture to which we can liken the influenced by the season; but it goes no departure of those brilliant leaves from the further than a rusty red, and stiffly retains boughs on the strong wing of the breeze. its not very ornamental mantle all winter In smaller trees, and shrubs and brambles through, as if it was useful at the least. even, instantes of brilliant colouring will And, by the way, old Evelyn was of the be seen, yellow, red, and purple, and some same opinion, "being gathered," he says, are scarlet as the scarlet tanagar of Ameri"somewhat before they are frost-bitten, ca. But upon these we may not insist, these leaves afford the best and easiest neither can we do more than allude to mattresses in the world to lay under our the blush of hips-and-haws that crimsons quilts instead of straw (!), because, besides autumnal hedgerows, the brilliant bunches their tenderness and loose lying together, of berries that flash out from the mounthey continue sweet for seven or eight tain ash in our northern countries, or, in years long, before which time straw be- our southern shires, the exquisite concomes musty and hard. They are thus trast shown in the fruit of the spindle-tree used by divers persons of quality in Dau- when the beautiful purple seed-vessel opens phiny, and in Switzerland. I have someto display the brilliant orange seeds. times lain on them to my very great refreshment: so as of this tree it may properly be said, Si'va domus, cubilia frondes, the wood as house, the leaves a bed." But, passing from a mere material consideration of this kind, cast a glance upon that ash which stands beside the beech, graceful and tall. Its pinnate leaves are palely yellow, and drop off speedily from their articulations, in order that this hard-wood tree shall not appear exceedingly affected by the change. Rapidly, too, flutter down the smaller leaves of the lofty elm: so that no large masses of foliage shall be transmuted, to shame with their brilliancy the venerable forest sage. Trees of softer grain revel in brilliant displays of colour. The poplar becomes bright yellow; the aspen NONE of the many other books which Mr. is frequently chequered brown and green Timbs has constructed out of a long life's from top to root, and sets up an extra curious reading and diligent note-taking are tremble of delight at its own appearance, more attractive than this. In it are grouped for the Highland legend is a mistake, which a great number and very pleasant variety tells us that it was the wood from which of facts, under six heads: Early English the Cross was male, and that its trembling Life,' Castle Life,' Household Antiquiarises on that account. But we have seen ties,' 'Peasant Life,'' Customs and Cereinosome sycamores and horse-chestnuts which nies,' and Historic Sketches.' Well printhave been surpassed by none, and have ed and furnished with half-a-dozen pretty had few equals, in the gorgeous splendour pictures, it is entitled to a place among the of their array. Their broad leaves burned Christmas gift-books. It is also solid enough with the most brilliant tinge of yellow, for use as a school-book. deepening into orange, and they retained a vast quantity of them, so that every bough was flaming and every twig flaunted a broad pennon. A few leaves of unusually bright green, hectic, as it were, before their change, served to set off the gorgeousness of the rest. We could find nothing comparable, save when a flock of the beautiful orange" orioles," descending upon a tree. amid the fields of Maryland, alight with extended wings, and make it one flash of splendour. And when they abandon it,

Nooks and Corners of English Life, Past and Present. By John Timbs, Author of

เ

Strange Stories of the Animal World,' Things not Generally Known,' &c. With Illustrations. Griffith and Farran.

6

It begins with description of the dwelling places of the early Britons, and of the state of civilization among the Britons before and after the Roman colonization. Then follow chapters on the domestic lite of the Saxons, and on Meals - British, Anglo-Roman, and Saxon.' Pleasant gossip of the same sort, about manners and customs at later periods of English history, are given in later chapters. This — giving evidence of the way in which Mr. Timbs compactly repeats what other recent writers have told at

greater length is from a chapter on housefurniture in the middle ages:

The scats were mostly forms, but chairs were sometimes used. A MS. of the fourteenth century has this item: "To put wainscote above the dais in the king's hall, and to make a fiue large and well sculptured chair." The early chair was a single seat without_arms. The fauldsteuel (fauteuil in modern French) was originally a folding stool of the curule form, but afterwards the form alone was preserved; examples remain from the time of Dagobert up to a late period. Dagobert's seat is considered by some to be of much greater antiquity than his time, and the back and arms are certainly of a later period than the rest. The so-called Glastonbury chair is much to be commended for simplicity of form, perfect strength, and adap

tation for comfort.

In the carlier times, chairs and benches were not stuffed, but had cushions to sit upon and cloths spread over them. Afterwards, as the workmanship improved, they were stuffed and covered with tapestry, leather, or velvet. The forms and workmanship of these seats were generally very rude, but the stuff's that covered them were of great richness and value, and tastefully trimmed with fringes and gimps, fastened with large brass studs or nails.

The floors, which at an early period were laid with rushes, were at a later one covered with a carpet, called the bord carpet. Still, carpets were used very early in the castles and mansions of the wealthy. The manufacture of carpets is of great antiquity: we read of them in the sacred writings, they were found in the ruins of Pompeii, they were introduced from the East to Spain, from Spain they passed to France and England, and when Eleanor of Castile arrived in London, in 1255, the rooms of her abode were covered with carpets; they were used generally in the palace in the reign of Edward III. Turkey carpets were first advertised for sale in London in 1660. The manufacture of carpets was introduced into France by the celebrated Colbert, in 1646. A manufactory was opened in England during the reign of Henry VIII, established until 1685, when the revocation of but this branch of industry was not permanently the Edict of Nantes drove half a million of Protestants from France, many of whom, settling in this country, established the mauufacture of carpets. Brussels carpets were introduced from Tournay into Kidderminster in 1745.

The last section of Mr. Timbs's volume is of a very miscellaneous character. Ile gossips about the traditions of battle-fields and other memorable localities, describes some The description of the furniture in the great famous mansions and their famous occuchamber at Hengrave, the seat of Sir Robert pants, draws, from Mr. Riley's recent transKytson, temp. Henry VII., enumerates very lation of the old French Chronicle of Lonminutely the various articles; among which are, the carpet, the tables, the cupboards, the don,' fresh matter about Fair Rosamond, chairs, the stools, two great chairs, silk and vel- and uses other new publications for gossip vet coverings, curtains to the windows and about the Grand Remonstrance, Cavaliers doors, a great screen, the fire irons, branches and Roundheads, and so forth. for light, &c.

No. 1177. Fourth Series, No. 38. 22 December, 1866.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

1. The Library Map of Africa

2. Life of Our Lord

3. American Colony in Palestine

Spectator,
Quarterly Review,
Pall Mall Gazette,

706

707

726

4. Madonna Mary. Parts XI. and XII. Concluded Mrs. Oliphant,

727

5. The Coming Crisis in Rome

6. From the Gunroom to the Bench 7. Artemus Ward in London

POETRY: Love Not, 768.

SHORT ARTICLE: Professor Seeley, Author of Ecce Homo, 706.

It is said that the article in No. 1173, on Strauss, Renan, and Ecce Homo, was written by Dean Stanley.

We are sorry to fill up more than half of this number, by one article a double supply of Madonna Mary. This became a matter of necessity; for Messrs. Harper & Brothers procured early sheets of the last part, and, indignant that we should have a chance of profit, have published the work at a price below their ordinary rate. And this they did, although we long ago offered them our stereotype plates of the story, at the manufacturers' price. They preferred making a new set of plates, and selling their book at about half price, in order to destroy the value of our plates, and teach us not to meddle with "what is meat for our masters." Under the same cir

cumstances, they did the same with Miss Marjoribanks and Sir Brook Fossbrooke. We also have published these books, as advertised below, at the same low prices, and intend to keep the even tenor of our course, even though this great house should, like Apollyon in “Pilgrim's Progress," STRADDLE ACROSS THE WHOLE BREADTH OF THE WAY."

MADONNA MARY, by MRS. OLIPHANT. 50 cents.

SIR BROOK FOSSBROOKE, by Charles Lever. 50 cents.

MISS MARJORIBANKS, by Mrs. Oliphant. 75 cents.

Published by Littell, Son & Co., Boston. Wholesale dealers supplied on liberal terms. FATHER TOM AND THE POPE: or, a Night AT THE VATICAN. With a short account of the Author. This is called the "Amateur's Edition." It is small quarto, 72 pages superbly printed, price one dollar; published by our good friends John Penington & Son, Philadelphia. (Messrs. Penington will send a catalogue of 5000 French Books to those requesting it.)

LITTELL, SON, & CO., BOSTON.

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