history of languages. That which we now speak must have been preceded by a metaphorical and poetical language, and the latter by a hieroglyphical or sacred language."

If these remarks had been applied to written instead of spoken language we might have yielded them a partial assent; but in their present form the author's assertions are purely visionary, for what can we know of languages previously to the invention of letters? Many ages must have elapsed before complicated and abstract ideas could have been rendered audible and intelligible by speech; and a still longer period before thought, the most subtle and evanescent operation of the mind, could have been made visible, transmissible, and indestructible by the instrumentality of letters. It seems, moreover, a bad compliment to religion to assert its correspondence with the dark ages; but the author probably intended his remarks to apply to superstition: and it must be confessed that it is sometimes difficult to separate them, unless we recur to the well-known distinction between orthodoxy and heterodoxy.

CRIMINALS THROUGH IGNORANCE.

"OVER natural fools, children, and madmen," says Hobbes in his "Leviathan" (part 2, cap. 26)," there is no law, no more than over brute beasts, because they had never power to make any covenant, or to understand the consequences thereof. So also every man from whom any accident, not proceeding from his own default, hath taken away the means to take notice of any particular law, is excused if he observe it not; and, to speak properly, that is no law to him. The law of nature excepted, it belongeth to the essence of all other laws to be made known to every man that shall be obliged to obey them. And in ancient time, before letters were in common use, the laws were many times put in verse, that the rude people, taking pleasure in singing or reciting them, might the more easily retain them in memory. And for the same reason Solomon adviseth a man to bind the ten commandments upon his ten fingers; and for the law which Moses gave to the people at the renewing of the covenant, he biddeth them to write it upon the posts and doors of their houses, and to assemble the people, man, woman, and child, to hear it read."

Elian

Cicero tells us that among the Romans their children were taught to sing the law of the twelve tables, tanquam necessarium carmen. relates the same thing of the Cretans. Plato assures us that the laws of the Egyptians were the poems of the Goddess Isis. Plutarch records that Lycurgus and Draco issued their laws to the Spartans and Athenians in verse; and we learn from Maximus Tyriensis that the laws of Minos were also dictated in verse-all for the manifold purpose of affording additional facilities to their publication and remembrance. And to conclude where, perhaps, we ought to have begun, the first law, as to the forbidden fruit, was distinctly and emphatically made known to our first parents.

Singular is the contrast to these examples afforded by England, where there is no provision whatever for the promulgation of any law, no officer appointed to give it publicity, no attempt to communicate it to the people whom it subjects, by enactments that may almost be

called secret and unintelligible (for they are passed in the dark and written in lawyers' gibberish), to the pains and penalties of fine, imprisonment, transportation-death! It is no longer legal to plant spring-guns in unenclosed grounds, or any where without notice; but a legal man-trap, commonly called an Act of Parliament, may be set in the highways and byways-in grounds open and enclosed-without preparation or notice, and without redress for the innocent or unwary who may stumble upon it in the dark. Surely this requires a remedy, and there is an easy one at hand. Why should not every new Act of Parliament, or at least its substance, be translated into plain English, and announced from every pulpit in the kingdom, with such explanations as may render it intelligible, and such sanctions from scripture as may tend to promote its observance? We shall then have a vulgate, both of the divine and civil law-and if the people still go astray, we shall at least be freed from the opprobrium of having our jails filled with criminals through ignorance.

HOW TO STOP A COMPLAINT.

A MAN complaining to his rich father-in-law of his wife's abusive tongue, asked what he should do to restrain her impertinence.

"Tell my daughter," replied the old gentleman," that if I hear any more such complaints I shall disinherit her."

NAUTICAL ALLEGORIES.

"THUCYDIDES explains the profound horror of the sea felt by all the earlier races of mankind, when he tells us that the fear of pirates prevented the Greeks for a long time from inhabiting the coasts. This is the reason why Homer arms the hand of Neptune with a trident, which makes the earth tremble. This trident was only a hook for seizing vessels, and the poet calls it dent (or tooth), by an appropriate metaphor, prefixing a particle which gives it a superlative sense.

"In these piratical vessels we recognise the Bull, in which Jupiter carried off Europa; the Minotaur, or Bull of Minos, with which he bore away the young men and maidens of the coast of Attica. The yards of a vessel were called cornua navis—(the horns); the sails were termed its wings, alarum remigium ;-hence the monster which was to devour Andromeda, and the winged horse upon which Perseus came to deliver her. The thread of Ariadne is the art of navigation, which guided Theseus through the labyrinth of the Egean Isles."-Michelet's Principes de la Philosophie de l'Histoire, p. 236.

Comparatively recent times have indulged in similar allegories. Whittington's fortunate ship, the Cat, so named probably from its figure-head, was fabled into a quadruped, whence he derived all his wealth. But the schoolboy was surely illiberal, and perhaps not quite accurate in his deductions, when he declared that all the etymological inferences to be drawn from the Roman fleets and their crews, were unfavourable to their character, since they were compounded of naughty knaves and puppies-(Nauta-naves-puppes).

TWENTY-THREE MINUTES PAST TWO!

(FOUNDED ON A FACT.)

BY JOHN POOLE, ESQ.

Not easily jealous, but, being wrought,
Perplex'd in the extreme.-SHAKSPEARE.

"VERY well, Mr. Dewdney," said my wife. And she quitted the

Toom.

Now, had there been nothing more than the "very well," her willing acquiescence in what had preceded might have been inferred from it. But it was the "Mr. Dewdney!" And it may safely be taken as a rule, that when a woman Mr.-Dewdneys her husband, or a man Mrs.-Dewdneys his wife, there is some dissatisfaction in the case-so, at least, was it in the present. And all about what? Why, about so dull a companion -no; an un-companion, as Brumby.

We had been married nearly two years, and this disagreement, slight as it was, was the first that had ever occurred between us. How, indeed, could it have been otherwise? My dear Clara's temper is the sweetest in the world; as for mine-but ask Clara. She had left me alone in the parlour (where we had just finished breakfast), brooding over this our first quar-quarrel ?-away with the hateful word! -misunderstanding? even that is too strong a term. She had left me, then, brooding over our little tiff-ay, that's it ;—I had borne it for nearly two minutes-I was in agonies-I could endure it no longer. I rang the bell.

"John," said I, "go to the drawing-room".

I heard her pacing the room above; and the state of her mind, poor dear! was painfully indicated by her hasty and irregular step.

"John," said 1, "go to the drawing-room and tell your mistress I wish to see her."

She came, her smiles shining through her tears-she knew that 'twas for reconciliation I had summoned her. We rushed into each other's

arms.

"Clara!" cried I.

"Clarkson !" exclaimed she- -Charles Clarkson Dewdney is your humble servant, when styled at full length; but she always calls me Clarkson.

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Never, never again," said I, "let such a scene occur between us, dearest."

"Oh, never, love," said she.

Such a couple! Adam and Eve before they partook of that unlucky dessert, perhaps-but since then nothing like us!

"Then you won't ask that Mr. Brumby to dine here to-day," said my wife.

Observe the significant that. Never is that pronoun so applied, whether to man, dog, woman, cat, or child, but it is intended to convey the idea of dislike. See

"Send the dog out of the room."

There is nothing in that which any dog-excepting some very thinskinned dog indeed-could take as an offensive personality: the dog is momentarily in the way-that's all.

But" Send that dog out of the room."
Aug.-VOL. LXV. NO. CCLX.

2 G

Here the dog is unequivocally marked as an object of personal dislike -it is pointedly insulted-and no dog of becoming spirit but would quit, not the room only, but the house; nor ever return to it though it should see the whole town placarded with a guinea reward for its recovery. By" that Mr. Brumby," then, it is clear that my wife has no extraordinary regard for Mr. Brumby.

"Then you won't ask that Mr. Brumby to dine here to-day?"

(I had previously said I would ask Mr. Brumby to dinner; and that it was which provoked the horrid "Very well, Mr. Dewdney.") "I won't," now replied I.

"Very well," said my wife; and instead of quitting the room, she patted my cheek. Adam and Eve, indeed-!

"If you must ask him to dine with you," continued she, "take him to the Pangrowleon-he is so very disagreeable."

"I will, my dear Clara," said I.

Not the least of the advantages of belonging to a club is, that if you happen to have an acquaintance who is in any degree disagreeable or, disreputable, and whom, therefore, you would be unwilling to invite to your own house, you can take him to your club. No great harm can come of that.

"And, now, my love," said I, " tell me why it is you so much dislike Brumby?"

"The reason is," replied she, "he is such a bore!"

I never give up any one hastily, so I made as stout a fight for him as it was possible to make.

"Granted," said 1; "he is a bore-an intolerable, an insufferable bore; but then, you must acknowledge that he-he-in short, my love, he is a very good man."

"No doubt he is," said she; "he may possess every virtue under the sun: all that may qualify him for going to Heaven; but he is not qualified for pleasant society on earth."

"You must allow," said I (for I was resolved not to give him up), "you must allow that he talks a great deal."

Call you that talking!" exclaimed she. "He's a dull, drowsy proser: his talk is like the buzzing of a bee in a bottle. And then, he has but one subject to talk about-prints, prints, prints, eternally prints! his collection of prints! his Marc Antonio! his Albert Durer! his Bartolozzi! Paganini would play divinely upon one string for a quarter of an hour at a time; but then he could play upon the other three quite as well. Now your Mr. Brumby has but one string to his fiddle, and even upon that he's a very bad fiddler. Then, not only can he talk of nothing else, but he will not allow any other person a choice of subject-he cuts through them-rudely and impatiently interrupts them with a something or other about his eternal engravings. A little of that subject would be very well in its way; but to run it to death, as he does! Oh, the tiresome man! The best conversersand he has met some good ones at our table-are killed dead by him. One is anxious to listen to them, but, no ;-no chance for conversation where Mr. Brumby is."

"But, my love," said I (still resolved not to give him up), "he does not always interrupt it. On the contrary-he will often, when another person is in possession of the attention of the table, politely pretend to fall asleep.'

"It was upon such an occasion," said my wife, laughing, “that poor Hook stopped short in the midst of one of his liveliest sallies, and cried-Pray, silence, ladies and gentlemen, for a snore from Mr. Brumby.''

"But really, my dear Clara, you must allow," said I, (determined not to give him up) “you must allow that he is a perfect master of that, the only subject he ever opens his lips upon-that he is a connoisseur of the first rank-of taste refined, of judgment unerring.'

"Now, Clarkson," said she, "is that really your opinion? Come ; speak honestly."

66

Why," said I (more and more determined not to give him up), "my opinion upon the subject of engravings is of slight value, for I don't pretend to understand much about them; but Dom. Colnaghi, whose opinion is unquestionably first-rate, assures me that he is little better than an ignoramus; that he knows little or nothing of the matter; that he has merely got by rote the terms of the art and a string of names of the most eminent artists, from Marc Antonio to Charles Heath, which are perpetually in his mouth; and that if he should escape purchasing, on his own judgment, an H.B. for an Albert Durer, he would be a lucky fellow. However, my love, I must, in justice to him, say that that is not my opinion of him-it is only Dom. Colnaghi's." Having thus gallantly defended my friend, I sat down and wrote him the following note:

"Dear Brumby,

"Mornington Crescent,

66

Wednesday, 8th June.

"Mrs. Dewdney, I am sorry to say, is not very well; so, instead of coming here, pray meet me at the Pangrowleon at seven. It is an open day there for visiters.

"Yours, faithfully,

"C. C. DEWDNEY."

"At what time, dearest, do you think you shall get rid of your lively guest?" inquired my wife.

"Oh, at about nine, or half-after," replied I; "but I will not remain out later than I can help it, love."

"It was not for that I made the inquiry, dear," said she; "but I— you-"

I did not particularly remark it at the time; but it afterwards struck me forcibly, very forcibly, that she hesitated.

"Well, Clara; but what?" inquired I.

"Why, Clarkson, you are engaged with my brother Richard, at Hammersmith, to-morrow, to go up the river for a day's fishing. Now, instead of getting up at five in the morning (as you talked of doing) which will be so uncomfortable, so very uncomfortable for you, do get into an omnibus or a cab, and go down to-night. Richard, you know, will give you a bed."

"But, sweetest," said I

"Now, dearest," said she, "you shall-you must-I implore-I entreat. You will oblige me by going. I can't bear the thought of your hurrying out at such a barbarous hour as five. I shall be miserable if you refuse me."

Sweet, considerate soul! Could I refuse her any thing! and a request, too, whose object was my own convenience, my own comfort. Yet she pressed the request with an earnestness that—