pearance of which particularly struck my fancy. It was one of those rich morsels of quaint antiquity, which give such a peculiar charm to English landscape. It stood in the midst of a county filled with ancient families, and contained, within its cold and silent aisles, the congregated dust of many nobie generations. The interior walls were encrusted with monuments of every age and style. The light streamed through windows dimmed with armorial bearings, richly emblazoned in stained glass. In various parts of the church were tombs of knights, and high-born dames, of gorgeous workmanship, with their effigies in coloured marble. On every side, the eye was struck with some instance of aspiring mortality; some haughty memorial which human pride had erected over its kindred dust, in this temple of the most humble of all religions. In contrast to these, was the family of a wealthy citizen, who had amassed a vast fortune, and, having purchased the estate and mansion of a ruined nobleman in the neighbourhood, was endeavouring to assume all the style and dignity of a hereditary lord of the soil. The family always came to church en prince. They were rolled majestically along in a carriage emblazoned with arms. The crest glittered in silver radiance from every part of the harness where a crest could possibly be placed. A fat coachman in a three-cornered hat, richly laced, and a flaxen wig, curling close round his rosy face, was seated on the box, with a sleek Danish dog beside him. Two footmen in gorgeous liveries, with huge bouquets, and gold-headed canes, lolled behind. The carriage rose and sunk on its long springs with a peculiar stateliness of motion. The very horses champed their bits, arched their necks, and glanced their eyes more proudly than common horses; either because they had got a little of the family feeling, or were reined up more tightly than ordinary. I could not but admire the style with which this splendid pageant was brought up to the gate of the churchyard. There was a vast effect produced at the turning of an angle of the wall;-a great smacking of the whip; straining and scrambling of the horses; glistening of harness, and flashing of wheels through gravel. This was the moment of triumph and vain-glory to the coachman. The horses were urged and checked, until they were fretted into a foam. They threw out their feet in a prancing trot, dashing about pebbles at every step. The crowd of villagers sauntering quietly to church, opened preUnder the ministry of such a pastor, I found it im- cipitately to the right and left, gaping in vacant adpossible to get into the train of thought suitable to miration. On reaching the gate, the horses were the time and place; so having, like many other feeble pulled up with a suddenness that produced an imChristians, compromised with my conscience, by lay-mediate stop, and almost threw them on their ing the sin of my own delinquency at another per- haunches. son's threshold, I occupied myself by making observations on my neighbours. The congregation was composed of the neighbouring people of rank, who sat in pews sumptuously lined and cushioned, furnished with richly-gilded prayer-books, and decorated with their arms upon the pew doors; of the villagers and peasantry, who filled the back seats, and a small gallery beside the organ; and of the poor of the parish, who were ranged on benches in the aisles. The service was performed by a snuffling, well-fed vicar, who had a snug dwelling near the church. He was a privileged guest at all the tables of the neighbourhood, and had been the keenest foxhunter in the country, until age and good living had disabled him from doing any thing more than ride to see the hounds throw off, and make one at the hunting dinner. I was as yet a stranger in England, and curious to notice the manners of its fashionable classes. I found, as usual, that there was the least pretension where there was the most acknowledged title to respect. I was particularly struck, for instance, with the family of a nobleman of high rank, consisting of several sons and daughters. Nothing could be more simple and unassuming than their appearance. They generally came to church in the plainest equipage, and often on foot. The young ladies would stop and converse in the kindest manner with the peasantry, caress the children, and listen to the stories of the humble cottagers. Their countenances were open and beautifully fair, with an expression of high refinement, but at the same time, a frank | cheerfulness, and engaging affability. Their brothers were tall, and elegantly formed. They were dressed fashionably, but simply; with strict neatness and propriety, but without any mannerism or fopishness. Their whole demeanour was easy and natural, with that lofty grace, and noble frankness, which bespeak free-born souls that have never been checked in their growth by feelings of inferiority. There is a healthful hardiness about real dignity, that never dreads contact and communion with others, how ever humble. It is only spurious pride that is morbid and sensitive, and shrinks from every touch. I was pleased to see the manner in which they would converse with the peasantry about those rural concerns and field sports, in which the gentlemen of this country so much delight. In these conversations, there was neither haughtiness on the one part, nor servility on the other; and you were only reminded of the difference of rank by the habitual respect of the peasant. There was an extraordinary hurry of the footmen to alight, open the door, pull down the steps, and prepare every thing for the descent on earth of this august family. The old citizen first emerged his round red face from out the door, looking about him with the pompous air of a man accustomed to rule on 'change, and shake the stock-market with a nod. His consort, a fine, fleshy, comfortable dame, followed him. There seemed, I must confess, but little pride in her composition. She was the picture of broad, honest, vulgar enjoyment. The world went well with her; and she liked the world. She had fine clothes, a fine house, a fine carriage, fine children, every thing was fine about her it was nothing but driving about, and visiting and feasting. Life was to her a perpetual revel; it was one long Lord Mayor's day. Two daughters succeeded to this goodly couple. They certainly were handsome; but had a supercilious air that chilled admiration, and disposed the spectator to be critical. They were ultra-fashionables in dress, and, though no one could deny the richness of their decorations, yet their appropriateness might be questioned amidst the simplicity of a country church. They descended loftily from the carriage, and moved up the line of peasantry with a step that seemed dainty of the soil it trod on. They cast an excursive glance around, that passed coldly over the burly faces of the peasantry, until they met the eyes of the nobleman's family, when their countenances immediately brightened into smiles, and they made the most profound and elegant courtesies, which were returned in a manner that showed they were but slight acquaintances. I must not forget the two sons of this aspiring citizen, who came to church in a dashing curricle, with outriders. They were arrayed in the extremity of the mode, with all that pedantry of dress which marks the man of questionable pretensions to style. They kept entirely by themselves, eyeing every one askance that came near them, as if measuring his claims to respectability; yet they were without conversation, except the exchange of an occasional cant Frase. They even moved artificially, for their bodies, in compliance with the caprice of the day, had been disciplined into the absence of all ease and freedom. Art had done every thing to accomplish them as men of fashion, but Nature had denied them the nameless grace. They were vulgarly shaped, like men formed for the common purposes of life, and had that air of supercilious assumption which is never seen in the true gentleman. THE WIDOW AND HER SON. Pittie olde age, within whose silver haires Its DURING my residence in the country, I used frequently to attend at the old village church. shadowy aisles, its mouldering monuments, its dark oaken panelling, all reverend with the gloom of departed years, seemed to fit it for the haunt of solemn meditation. A Sunday, too, in the country, is so holy in its repose-such a pensive quiet reigns over the face of Nature, that every restless passion is charmed down, and we feel all the natural religion of the soul gently springing up within us. "Sweet day, so pure, so calm, so bright, I have been rather minute in drawing the pictures of these two families, because I considered them specimens of what is often to be met with in this country-the unpretending great, and the arrogant little. I have no respect for titled rank, unless it be accompanied by true nobility of soul; but I have remarked, in all countries where these artificial distinctions exist, that the very highest classes are al-man; but there are feelings that visit me in a country ways the most courteous and unassuming. Those who are well assured of their own standing, are least apt to trespass on that of others: whereas, nothing is so offensive as the aspirings of vulgarity, which thinks to elevate itselt by humiliating its neighbour. As I have brought these families into contrast, I must notice their behaviour in church. That of the nobleman's family was quiet, scrious, and attentive. Not that they appeared to have any fervour of devotion, but rather a respect for sacred things, and sacred places, inseparable from good-breeding. The xhers, on the contrary, were in a perpetual flutter and whisper; they betrayed a continual consciousness of finery, and the sorry ambition of being the wonders of a rural congregation. The old gentleman was the only one really attentive to the service. He took the whole burden of family devotion upon himself; standing bolt upright, and uttering the responses with a loud voice that might be heard all over the church. It was evident that he was one of these thorough church and king men, who connect the idea of devotion and loyalty; who consider the Deity, some how or other, of the government party, and religion “a very excellent sort of thing, that ought to be countenanced and kept up." When he joined so loudly in the service, it seemed more by way of example to the lower orders, to show them, that though so great and wealthy, he was not above being religious; as I have seen a turtle-fed alderman swallow publicly a basin of charity soup, smacking his lips at every mouthful, and pronouncing it "excellent food for the poor." When the service was at an end, I was curious to witness the several exits of my groups. The young noblemen and their sisters, as the day was fine, preferred strolling home across the fields, chatting with the country people as they went. The others departed as they came, in grand parade. Again were the equipages wheeled up to the gate. There was again the smacking of whips, the clattering of hoofs, and the glittering of harness. The horses started off almost at a bound; the villagers again hurried to right and left; the wheels threw up a cloud of dust, and the aspiring family was wrapt out of sight ir a whirlwind. I cannot lay claim to the merit of being a devout church, amid the beautiful serenity of Nature, which I experience nowhere else; and if not a more religious, I think I am a better man on Sunday, than on any other day of the seven. But in this church I felt myself continually thrown back upon the world, by the frigidity and pomp of the poor worms around me. The only being that seemed thoroughly to feel the humble and prostrate piety of a true Christian, was a poor decrepit old woman, bending under the weight of years and infirmities. She bore the traces of something better than abject poverty. The lingerings of decent pride were visible in her appearance. Her dress, though humble in the extreme, was scrupulously clean. Some trivial respect, too, had been awarded her, for she did not take her seat among the village poor, but sat alone on the steps of the altar. She seemed to have survived all love, all friendship, all society; and to have nothing left her but the hopes of heaven. When I saw her feebly rising and bending her aged form in prayer; habitually conning her prayer-book, which her palsied hand and failing eyes could not permit her to read, but which she evidently knew by heart; I felt persuaded that the faltering voice of that poor woman arose to heaven far before the responses of the clerk, the swell of the organ, or the chanting of the choir. I am fond of loitering about country churches; and this was so delightfully situated, that it frequently attracted me. It stood on a knoll, round which a small stream made a beautiful bend, and then wound its way through a long reach of soft meadow scenery The church was surrounded by yew trees, which seemed almost coeval with itself. Its tall Gothic spire shot up lightly from among them, with rooks and crows generally wheeling about it. I was seated there one still sunny morning, watching two labourers who were digging a grave. They had chosen one of the most remote and neglected corners of the churchyard, where, by the number of nameless graves around, it would appear that the indigent and friendless were huddled into the earth. I was told that the new-made grave was for the only son of a poor widow. While I was meditating on the distinctions of worldly rank, which extend thus down into the very dust, the toll of the bell announced the approach of the funeral. They were the obsequies of poverty, with which pride had nothing to do. A coffin of the plainest materials, without pall or other covering, was borne by some of the villagers. The sexton walked before with an air of cold indifference. There were no mock mourners in the trappings of affected wo, but there was one real mourner who feebly tottered after the corpse. It was the aged mother of the deceasedthe poor old woman whom I had seen seated on the steps of the altar. She was supported by an humble friend, who was endeavouring to comfort her. A few of the neighbouring poor had joined the train, and some children of the village were running hand in hand, now shouting with unthinking mirth, and now pausing to gaze, with childish curiosity, on the grief of the mourner. solitary, destitute, mourning over an only son, the last solace of her years;—these are indeed sorrows which make us feel the impotency of consolation. It was some time before I left the churchyard. On my way homeward, I inet with the woman who had acted as comforter: she was just returning from accompanying her mother to her lonely habitation, and I drew from her some particulars connected with the affecting scene I had witnessed. The parents of the deceased had resided in the As the funeral train approached the grave, the par- village from childhood. They had inhabited one of son issued from the church porch, arrayed in the sur-the neatest cottages, and by various rural occupaplice, with prayer-book in hand, and attended by the tions, and the assistance of a small garden, had supclerk. The service, however, was a mere act of ported themselves creditably and comfortably, and charity. The deceased had been destitute, and the led a happy and a blameless life. They had one son, survivor was pennyless. It was shuffled through, who had grown up to be the staff and pride of their therefore, in form, but coldly and unfeelingly. The age.-"Oh, sir! said the good woman, "he was well-fed priest moved but a few steps from the church such a comely lad, so sweet-tempered, so kind to door; his voice could scarcely be heard at the grave; every one around him, so dutiful to his parents! It and never did I hear the funeral service, that sublime did one's heart good to see him of a Sunday, drest and touching ceremony, turned into such a frigid out in his best, so tall, so straight, so cheery, sup‐ mummery of words. porting his old mother to church-for she was always fonder of leaning on George's arm, than on her good man's; and, poor soul, she might well be proud of him, for a finer lad there was not in the country round." I approached the grave. The coffin was placed on the ground. On it were inscribed the name and age of the deceased-"George Somers, aged 26 years." The poor mother had been assisted to kneel down at the head of it. Her withered hands were clasped, as if in prayer; but I could perceive, by a feeble rocking of the body, and a convulsive motion of the lips, that she was gazing on the last relics of her son with the yearnings of a mother's heart. Preparations were made to deposit the coffin in the earth. There was that bustling stir, which breaks so harshly on the feelings of grief and affection: directions given in the cold tones of business; the striking of spades into sand and gravel; which, at the grave of those we love, is of all sounds the most withering. The bustle around seemed to waken the mother from a wretched reverie. She raised her glazed eyes, and looked about with a faint wildness. As the men approached with cords to lower the coffin into the grave, she wrung her hands, and broke into an agony of grief. The poor woman who attended her, took her by the arm, endeavoured to raise her from the earth, and to whisper something like consolation-"Nay, now-nay, now-don't take it so sorely to heart.' She could only shake her head, and wring her hands, as one not to be comforted. As they lowered the body into the earth, the creaking of the cords seemed to agonize her; but when, on some accidental obstruction, there was a jostling of the coffin, all the tenderness of the mother burst forth; as if any harm could come to him who was far beyond the reach of worldly suffering. I could see no more-my heart swelled into my hroat-my eyes filled with tears-I felt as if I were acting a barbarous part in standing by and gazing idly on this scene of maternal anguish. I wandered to another part of the churchyard, where I remained until the funeral train had dispersed. When I saw the mother slowly and painfully quitting the grave, leaving behind her the remains of all that was dear to her on earth, and returning to silence and destitution, my heart ached for her. What, thought I, are the distresses of the rich? They have friends to soothe-pleasures to beguile-a world to divert and dissipate their griefs. What are the sorrows of the young? Their growing minds soon close above the wound-their elastic spirits soon rise beneath the pressure-their green and ductile affections soon twine around new objects. But the sorrows of the poor, who have no outward appliances to soothe the sorrows of the aged, with whom life at best is but a wintry day, and who can look for no after-growth of joy-the sorrows of a widow, aged, Unfortunately, the son was tempted, during a year of scarcity and agricultural hardship, to enter into the service of one of the small craft that plied on a neighbouring river. He had not been long in this employ, when he was entrapped by a press-gang, and carried off to sea. His parents received tidings of his seizure, but beyond that they could learn nothing. It was the loss of their main prop. The father, who was already infirm, grew heartless and melancholy, and sunk into his grave. The widow, left lonely in her age and feebleness, could no longer support herself, and came upon the parish. Still there was a kind of feeling toward her throughout the village, and a certain respect as being one of the oldest inhabitants. As no one applied for the cottage in which she had passed so many happy days, she was permitted to remain in it, where she lived solitary and almost helpless. The few wants of nature were chiefly supplied from the scanty productions of her little garden, which the neighbours would now and then cultivate for her. It was but a few days before the time at which these circumstances were told me, that she was gathering some vegetables for her repast, when she heard the cottage-door which faced the garden suddenly opened. A stranger came out, and seemed to be looking eagerly and wildly around. He was dressed in seamen's clothes, was emaciated and ghastly pale, and bore the air of one broken by sickness and hardships. He saw her, and hastened toward her, but his steps were faint and faltering; he sank on his knees before her, and sobbed like a child. The poor woman gazed upon him with a vacant and wandering eye-"Oh my dear, dear mother! don't you know your son? your poor boy George?" It was, indeed, the wreck of her once noble lad; who, shattered by wounds, by sickness, and foreign imprisonment, had, at length, dragged his wasted limbs homeward, to repose among the scenes of his childhood. I will not attempt to detail the particulars of such a meeting, where sorrow and joy were so completely blended: still he was alive!-he was come home!he might yet live to comfort and cherish her old age! Nature, however, was exhausted in him; and if any thing had been wanting to finish the work of fate, the desolation of his native cottage would have been sufficient. He stretched himself on the pallet on which his widowed mother had passed many a sleepless night, and he never rose from it again. The villagers, when they heard that George Somers had returned, crowded to see him, offering every comfort and assistance that their humble means afforded. He was too weak, however, to talk--he could only look his thanks. His mother was his constant attendant; and he seemed unwilling to be helped by any other hand. There is something in sickness that breaks down the pride of manhood; that softens the heart, and brings it back to the feelings of infancy. Who that has languished, even in advanced life, in sickness and despondency; who that has pined on a weary bed in the neglect and loneliness of a foreign land; but has thought on the mother "that looked on his childhood," that smoothed his pillow, and administered to his helplessness? Oh! there is an enduring tenderness in the love of a mother to a son, that transcends all other affections of the heart. It is neither to be chilled by selfishness, nor daunted by danger, nor weakened by worthlessness, nor stifled by ingratitude. She will sacrifice every comfort to his convenience; she will surrender every pleasure to his enjoyment; she will glory in his fame, and exult in his prosperity;-and, if misfortune overtake him, he will be the dearer to her from misfortune; and if disgrace settle upon his name, she wi!! still love and cherish him in spite of his disgrace; and if all the world beside cast him off, she will be all the world to him. of satisfaction, that she had quietly breathed her last, and had gone to rejoin those she loved, in that world where sorrow is never known, and friends are never parted. THE BOAR'S HEAD TAVERN, EASTCHEAP. A SHAKSPERIAN RESEARCH. "A tavern is the rendezvous, the exchange, the staple of good fellows. I have heard my great-grandfather tell, how his greatgreat-grandfather should say, that it was an old proverb when his great-grandfather was a child, that it was a good wind that blew a man to the wine.'" MOTHER BOMBIE. IT is a pious custom, in some Catholic countries, to honour the memory of saints by votive lights burnt before their pictures. The popularity of a saint, therefore, may be known by the number of these offerings. One, perhaps, is left to moulder in the darkness of his little chapel; another may have a solitary lamp to throw its blinking rays athwart his effigy; while the whole blaze of adoration is lavished at the shrine of some beatified father of renown. The wealthy devotee brings his huge luminary of wax; the eager zealot, his seven-branched Poor George Somers had known what it was to candlestick; and even the mendicant pilgrim is by be in sickness, and none to soothe-lonely and in no means satisfied that sufficient light is thrown prison, and none to visit him. He could not endure upon the deceased, unless he hangs up his little lamp his mother from his sight; if she moved away, his of smoking oil. The consequence is, in the eagereye would follow her. She would sit for hours by ness to enlighten, they are often apt to obscure; and his bed, watching him as he slept. Sometimes he I have occasionally seen an unlucky saint almost would start from a feverish dream, and looking anx-smoked out of countenance by the officiousness of iously up until he saw her bending over him, when he would take her hand, lay it on his bosom, and fall asleep with the tranquillity of a child. In this way he died. My first impulse, on hearing this humble tale of affliction, was to visit the cottage of the mourner, and administer pecuniary assistance, and, if possible, comfort. I found, however, on inquiry, that the good feelings of the villagers had prompted them to do every thing that the case admitted; and as the poor know best how to console each other's sorrows, I did not venture to intrude. The next Sunday I was at the village church; when, to my surprise, I saw the poor old woman tottering down the aisle to her accustomed seat on the steps of the altar. She had made an effort to put on something like mourning for her son; and nothing could be more touching than this struggle between pious affection and utter poverty: a black riband or so-a faded black handkerchief-and one or two more such humble attempts to express by outward signs that grief which passes show. -When I looked round upon the storied monuments, the stately hatchments, the cold marble pomp, with which grandeur mourned magnificently over departed pride, and turned to this poor widow, bowed down by age and sorrow at the altar of her God, and offering up the prayers and praises of a pious, though a broken heart, I felt that this living monument of real grief was worth them all. I related her story to some of the wealthy members of the congregation, and they were moved by it. They exerted themselves to render her situation more comfortable, and to lighten her afflictions. It was, however, but smoothing a few steps to the grave. In the course of a Sunday or two after, she was missed from her usual seat at church, and before I left the neighbourhood, I heard, with a feeling his followers. In like manner has it fared with the immortal Shakspeare. Every writer considers it his bounden duty, to light up some portion of his character or works, and to rescue some merit from oblivion. The commentator, opulent in words, produces vast tomes of dissertations; the common herd of editors send up mists of obscurity from their notes at the bottom of each page; and every casual scribbler brings his farthing rush-light of eulogy or research, to swell the cloud of incense and of smoke. As I honour all established usages of my brethren of the quill, I thought it but proper to contribute my mite of homage to the memory of the illustrious bard. I was for some time, however, sorely puzzled in what way I should discharge this duty. I found myself anticipated in every attempt at a new reading; every doubtful line had been explained a dozen different ways, and perplexed beyond the reach of elucidation; and as to fine passages, they had all been amply praised by previous admirers: nay, so completely had the bard, of late, been overlarded with panegyric by a great German critic, that it was difficult now to find even a fault that had not been argued into a beauty. In this perplexity, I was one morning turning over his pages, when I casually opened upon the comic scenes of Henry IV., and was, in a moment, com pletely lost in the madcap revelry of the Boar's Head Tavern. So vividly and naturally are these scenes of humour depicted, and with such force and consistency are the characters sustained, that they become mingled up in the mind with the facts and personages of real life. To few readers does it occur, that these are all ideal creations of a poet's brain, and that, in sober truth, no such knot of merry roysters ever enlivened the dull neighbourhood of Eastcheap. For my part, I love to give myself up to the illusions of poetry. A hero of fiction that never existed, is To be versed in the history of Eastcheap, great just as valuable to me as a hero of history that ex- and little, from London Stone even unto the Monuisted a thousand years since: and, if I may be ex-ment, was, doubtless, in her opinion, to be acquaintcused such an insensibility to the common ties of ed with the history of the universe. Yet, with all human nature, I would not give up fat Jack for half this, she possessed the simplicity of true wisdom, and the great men of ancient chronicle. What have the that liberal, communicative disposition, which I heroes of yere done for me, or men like me? They have generally remarked in intelligent old ladies, have conquered countries of which I do not enjoy an knowing in the concerns of their neighbourhood. acre; or they have gained laurels of which I do not inherit a leaf; or they have furnished examples of hair-brained prowess, which I have neither the opportunity nor the inclination to follow. But old Jack Falstaff!-kind Jack Falstaff-sweet Jack Falstaff! has enlarged the boundaries of human enjoyment; he has added vast regions of wit and good-humour, in which the poorest man may revel; and has bequeathed a never-failing inheritance of jolly laughter, to make mankind merrier and better to the latest posterity. A thought suddenly struck me: "I will make a pilgrimage to Eastcheap," said I, closing the book, "and see if the old Boar's Head Tavern still exists. Who knows but I may light upon some legendary traces of Dame Quickly and her guests; at any rate, there will be a kindred pleasure, in treading the halls once vocal with their mirth, to that the toper enjoys in smelling to the empty cask, once filled with generous wine.' Her information, however, did not extend far back into antiquity. She could throw no light upon the history of the Boar's Head, from the time that Dame Quickly espoused the valiant Pistol, until the great fire of London, when it was unfortunately burnt down. It was soon rebuilt, and continued to flourish under the old name and sign, until a dying landlord, struck with remorse for double scores, bad measures, and other iniquities which are incident to the sinful race of publicans, endeavoured to make his peace with Heaven, by bequeathing the tavern to St. Michael's church, Crooked-lane, toward the supporting of a chaplain. For some time the vestry meetings were regularly held there; but it was observed that the old Boar never held up his head under church government. He gradually declined, and finally gave his last gasp about thirty years since. The tavern was then turned into shops; but she informed me that a picture of it was still preserved in St. Michael's church, which stood just in the rear. The resolution was no sooner formed than put in To get a sight of this picture was now my determi execution. I forbear to treat of the various advent-nation; so, having informed myself of the abode of ures and wonders I encountered in my travels, of the haunted regions of Cock-lane; of the faded glories of Little Britain, and the parts adjacent; what perils I ran in Cateaton-street and Old Jewry; of the renowned Guildhall and its two stunted giants, the pride and wonder of the city, and the terror of all unlucky urchins; and how I visited London Stone, and struck my staff upon it, in imitation of that arch-rebel, Jack Cade. the sexton, I took my leave of the venerable chronicler of Eastcheap, my visit having doubtless raised greatly her opinion of her legendary lore, and furnished an important incident in the history of her life. It cost me some difficulty, and much curious inquiry, to ferret cut the humble hanger-on to the church. I had to explore Crooked-lane, and diver little alleys, and elbows, and dark passages, with which this old city is perforated, like an ancient cheese, or a worm-eaten chest of drawers. At length I traced him to a corner of a small court, surround Let it suffice to say, that I at length arrived in merry Eastcheap, that ancient region of wit and wassail, where the very names of the streets relished ofed by lofty houses, where the inhabitants enjoy about good cheer, as Pudding-lane bears testimony even at the present day. For Eastcheap, says old Stow, "was always famous for its convivial doings. The cookes cried hot ribbes of beef roasted, pies well | baked, and other victuals; there was clattering of pewter pots, harne, pipe, and sawtrie." Alas! how sadly is the scene changed since the roaring days of Falstaff and old Stow! The madcap royster has given place to the plodding tradesman; the clattering of pots and the sound of "harpe and sawtrie," to the din of carts and the accurst dinging of the dustman's bell; and no song is heard, save, haply, the strain of some syren from Billingsgate, chanting the eulogy of deceased mackerel. I sought, in vain, for the ancient abode of Dame Quickly. The only relict of it is a boar's head, carved in relief stone, which formerly served as the sign, but, at present, is built into the parting line of two houses which stand on the site of the renowned old tavern. For the history of this little empire of good fellowship, I was referred to a tallow-chandler's widow, opposite, who had been born and brought up on the spot, and was looked up to, as the indisputable chronicler of the neighbourhood. I found her seated in a little back parlour, the window of which looked out upon a yard about eight feet square, laid out as a flower-garden; while a glass door opposite afforded a distant peep of the street, through a vista of soap and tallow candles; the two views, which comprised, in all probability, her prospects in life, and the little world in which she had lived, and moved, and had her being, for the better part of a century. as much of the face of heaven, as a community of frogs at the bottom of a well. The sexton was a meek, acquiescing little man, of a bowing, lowly habit; yet he had a pleasant twinkling in his eye, and if encouraged, would now and then venture a small pleasantry; such as a man of his low estate might venture to make in the company of high church wardens, and other mighty men of the earth. I found him in company with the deputy organist, seated apart, like Milton's angels; discoursing, no doubt, on high doctrinal points, and settling the atfairs of the church over a friendly pot of ale; for the lower classes of English seldom deliberate on any weighty matter, without the assistance of a cool tankard to clear their understandings. I arrived at the moment when they had finished their ale and their argument, and were about to repair to the church to put it in order; so, having made known my wishes, I received their gracious permission to accompany them. The church of St. Michael's, Crooked-lane, standing a short distance from Billingsgate, is enriched with the tombs of many fishmongers of renown; and as every profession has its galaxy of glory, and its constellation of great men, I presume the monument of a mighty fishmonger of the olden time is regarded with as much reverence by succeeding generations of the craft, as poets feel on contemplating the tomb of Virgil, or soldiers the monument of a Marlborough or Turenne. I cannot but turn aside, while thus speaking of illustrious men, to observe that St. Michael's, Črooked-lane, contains also the ashes of that doughty cham |