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invoked it by the name of Iunx; and the Enchantress Circe used its flesh in her spells.

The THRUSH was much prized by Roman epicures, who fed it on figs and fine flour: presents were made of fat thrushes, bound round

in the form of a crown.

Ere we concluded our ornithological notices, we might have been expected to speak of the royal eagle; but as the king of birds, as the chosen emblem of various nations, it has attracted so much attention from historians, poets, and naturalists, that we fear they have left us nothing to glean after them-nothing to offer that would not be too trite and familiar; and we may say the same of the owl, the vulture, and other principal birds which have been adopted into national blazonry. So here we take our leave of the reader, and close our

AVIARY.

M. E. M.

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THE IRISH BRIGADESMAN:

A TALE OF THE WAR OF THE SUCCESSION.

By the Author of "Whitefriars," “Mauleverer's Divorce," &e.

CHAPTER I.

SARSFIELD, LORD LUCAN.

SHOUTS and uproarious cries, yet apparently, even to those to whom the language was one of unknown barbarism, of enthusiastic joy and welcome, in Irish tones, rang along the streets leading from the Castle to the Thomond Gate of Limerick.

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Glory be to God, and His brightness on your honor's lordship's pathway, for ever and ever, and a bit at the end of it!" burst in native Erse, or English almost as peculiarly national in vehement accentuation and forms of expression, from scores and scores of lips, as the wild soldiers and still wilder rabble who composed the principal part of the Irish Jacobite garrison of the city, in the memorable "Year of Sorrow," 1691, crowded to the doors and exits of their quarters and dwellings in the narrow streets and darksome, pestilential alleys of old Limerick, to witness the passage of their beloved leader, Patrick Sarsfield, Lord Lucan, on the first occasion of his presenting himself in public after taking possession of the military government of the town, in conjunction with Monsieur d'Usson, General of the French Allies of the last of the evil-starred Stuart kings of Great Britain and Ireland.

On this day King James the Second's Lord Deputy of Ireland, Richard Talbot, Duke of Tyrconnel, finished characteristically his career of revelry and debauchery, in consequence of an apoplexy brought on by excessive indulgence in the pleasures of the table, a few days previously at a feast. And the death of this "like-master-like-man" Viceroy had permitted the complete lapse into worthier hands of the little authority his indolence, and the universal contempt into which his failures and vices degraded him, allowed the favourite of the fugitive sovereign to retain among the Irish Jacobites.

Of these latter, the defeated and shattered forces were now collected from many scenes of slaughter and overthrow, within the walls of Limerick, the last town of any strength or consequence that remained in their hands. It was about a month from the date of the great battle of Aughrim, which had proved in the most terribly decisive manner the superiority in the field of the arms of the "Dutch usurper," as William III. was called and considered by the adherents of the fatherin-law he had dethroned. And this day we speak of was rendered one of additional agitation and alarm in Limerick by the appearance of the advanced guard of the English army. Numerous bodies of glittering and well-appointed cuirassiers, lightening menacingly along the horizon, announced the approach of conquerors whom violent party animosity, and

the injuries and insults of a civil war which had now raged for upwards of three years, inspired with the most merciless hostility. The speedy formation of a siege might be looked for, in which the only hope of the Irish royalists or rebels, as they were alternately styled by the contending factions of the rival kings, must lie in protracting to all those extremities of resistance of which the defence of Londonderry by the opposite party had given an example terrible in its sufferings, however glorious in its results. Yet, as we have commemorated, no sooner were the soldiers and people of Limerick aware of the presence of the beloved chief, whom they knew they were to accept as the very symbol of a determination to this effect, than every trace of despondency and terror vanished, and they crowded around him with an impassioned gratulation that among other nations would only have been bestowed upon the warrior who had actually rescued them from the great peril and adversity in which they were plunged.

This vainly heroic partizan of a doomed cause was accompanied by a retinue of officers, all mounted, but on sorry nags, that looked as if they had been jaded and starved into mere anatomies by a long course of severe service and light provender. Sarsfield's steed, however, still retained a degree of fiery action, or his own unflagging and high-lifting spirit communicated itself by some magnetism to the poor beast, whose dark shaggy coat showed the seams of several frightful, half-healed gashes of the sabre. It curvetted proudly along under its burden, snorting the foam from its dilated nostrils in many a haughty toss of the head among the thronging populace. The new Governor meanwhile acknowledged the uproarious tokens of his popularity by raising his buff-gloved hand to his plumed hat, bowing, smiling, and uttering a thousand good-humoured, sprightly observations to the exulting multitude, that crowded like billows round the keel of some stately vessel on his way. Above all, to the women-even to the most haggish, unsexed-looking beings of the half-savage populace of the city, who loaded him with blessings and enthusiastic commendations as he passed he had unnumbered laughing gallantries and cheerful exchanges of salute and compliment to offer.

"The Lord reward him for the sparkle of the dear comfort in his eyes! The angels keep the bullet from his breastplate, that shines with the true heart in it more than the steel! Good luck and long life to him, whatever comes of us and our children and theirs, to the beginning of eternity!" are but poor samples of the glowing benedictions and expressions of rejoicing good will that accompanied the progress of the popular Irish hero through throngs whose appearance combined. every variety of physical misery, that starvation, wounds, and rags, could assist in forming-even among those whose possession of pikes, rusty muskets, and the tattered remains of uniforms, indicated of a class not likely to allow itself to fare the worst in a community.

In personal characteristics the famous partizan leader was fashioned to command the regards and homage of a rude people, accustomed to bestow their admiration chiefly on those qualities of body and mind which give their possessor a visible and tangible superiority. Sarsfield was tall, and powerfully made; his features were large but well formed, animated and soldier-like in their expression-presenting, like his cha

VOL. III.

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