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just recited. The excellent military road in that county, constructed under the late General Wade, running through part of his estate, he has recorded his sense of this improvement by a conspicuous monument, on which is inscribed the following distich:

"Had you seen this road before it was made,

You'd lift up your hands, and bless General Wade."

A certain bruising parson having been examined as a witness in the Court of King's Bench, the adverse council attempted to brow-beat him :-" think you are the bruising Parson," said he. " I am," said the divine;" and if you doubt it, I'll give it you under my band:"

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Dr. Walker, Professor of Natural History at Edinburgh, a man of great science, and also of great worth, is not a little finical in dress. His hair-dressing was, till lately that he got a wig, the work of two or three hours every day. Once when he was travelling from Moffat, where he was then minister, to pay a visit to the late Sir James Clerk, of Pennycuick, he stopped at a country barber's 'shop on the way, in order to have his hair dressed. The barber, who, although he had often heard of his customer, but was unacquainted with his person, did all that he could to obey his númerous directions which he received; with astonishing patience did he for three hours curl, uncurl, friz, and labour at the Doctor's hair; at length, however, he could not avoid exclaiming"Why, in all my life, I never heard of a man so ill to please as you, except the mad Minister of Moffat!"

When Sir John Scott brought in his bill for restricting the liberty of the press, an Irish Peer suggested that all anonymous publications should have the name of the author on the title-page!

......

An Irishman purchased the sixteenth of a lottery-ticket, for which, as tickets were high, he paid a guinea and a half. In a few days it came up a twenty-pound prize, for which, on application at the lottery-office, he received three-andtwenty shillings. "Well," says Pat, "I am glad it is no worse. As it was but a twenty-pound, I have only lost eight-and-sixpence; but, by Jasus, if it had been a twenty-thousand I should have been ruined."

A small wine-merchant knowing that nothing could win Mr. Elwes's heart so much as to make him presents, begged his acceptance of some very fine wine, and in a short time obtained the loan of several hundred pounds. Elwes used ever after to say, "It was, indeed, very fine, for it cost him twenty pounds a bottle!"

.......

In the year 1793, when the Duke of Richmond had the command of the camp on Warley Common, he ordered that a captain should always do duty in the kitchen, to superintend the dressing of the soldiers meat. Being asked the reason, he said it was, that his officers might be accustomed to stand fire.

The keeper of a paltry alehouse had on his sign, after his name, the letters, M. D. F. R. S. A Physician, who was moreover of the Royal Society,

his name.

asked him how he presumed to affix these letters to "Indeed, Sir," said he, "I have as good a right as you have."-"What do you mean, you impudent scoundrel?” "I mean," returned the other, "that I am Drum-Major of the Royal Scots Fuzileers."

An attorney in France having purchased a charge of bailiff for his son, advised him never to work in vain, but to raise contributions on those who wanted his assistance. "What! father," said the son, in surprise, "would you have me sell justice?"-"Why not?" answered the father: "is so scarce an article to be given for nothing ?”

Lord Armadale, one of the Scotch Judges, and son-in-law to the late celebrated Lord Justice Clerk, has a son, who at the age of eleven or twelve rose to the rank of a Major. One morning his mother hearing a noise in the rursery, rang to know the cause of it," It is only," said the servant, "the Major greeting for his porridge *."

There being a lawsuit between Mr. Foot and Mr Ross, respecting the Edinburgh theatre, let by the latter to the former, which came by appeal before the house of lords, the matter was terminated in favour of Ross, and Foot was saddled with the costs. When he paid the bill to Mr. Walter Ross, Mr. Ross's Scotch solicitor, he said to him, "Now, Walter, when do you go to Scotland?"-" Tomorrow. ."—" And how do you travel? I suppose, like the rest of your countrymen, you will do it in

* Crying for his breakfast.

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The journeymen tailors, by their protracted dispute, seem desirous to widen the breach, forgetting, no doubt, the good old professional adage, that 66 a stitch in time saves nine!"

The new fashioned carriages, with which the streets of the metropolis now abound, are by no means creditable to the taste of the times. Their shape bears some resemblance to a clumsy tub, and they are hung so excessively low, that the coachman seems as if placed upon a watch-tower to keep a good look-out for the company below.

For the Monthly Visitor.

THOUGHTS ON MONUMENTAL INSCRIPTIONS.

Can storied urn, or animated bust,

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can honour's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or flattery soothe the dull cold ear of death?

HE Elegy of Gray (from which I have here T

sally admired for the dignified simplicity of style in which it is written. The poet having in a preceding verse mentioned that the boast of heraldry, the pomp of power, and all the attendants on beauty and wealth, were destined in the course of events to sink into oblivion, proceeds in this stanza, under the form of a question, to remonstrate against the

ridiculous practice of making for deceased persons superb monuments, bedecked with flattering inscriptions. For friends to follow to the grave a relative, whose general plan of life was known to have been not quite what it ought to have been, must necessarily be a grievous task: but it surely is no excuse for their erecting to his memory a pompous monument, overspread with flattery; telling the world he possessed virtues which never belonged to him; in fact, endeavouring to make us believe that to be virtuous which in reality was disgraceful or criminal. This is a strange abuse of words and facts, and jusly merits the animadversions made by the late amiable Dr. Enfield, in a sermon which he wrote on the Moral Abuse of Words.

But although it is highly censurable thus to decorate a little spot which encloses a lifeless corpse, I think we may assert, that monuments with appropriate inscriptions, have their utility. They tend to call into action the benevolent sympathies of our nature. This is my first remark. Were we to enter a burial-ground, like that of the Quakers, in which there was not a single stone; in which nothing appeared but the grassy hillock, to inform us of the contents of the place, we might possibly have many humiliating, yet useful, ideas enter our mind. But how much more vigorously are our benevolent and tender sympathies likely to arise when turning our eyes around, we behold on yon stone the name of one with whom we have often had sweet converse. When we see, that he who started in life along with us is gone before us, has given up the concern he had in sublunary affairs, when we think that his soul, ere this, has explored a very momentous country, knows, perhaps, some little of its doom-can we refrain from considering

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