afterwards walked upwards of four hundred miles without meeting a human being. Wherever he went he seems to have accommodated himself to the habits of the people, however rude and disgusting. With the Kalmucks, he eat horse-flesh, elks, and wolves; and with the Tchutski he found as little difficulty in pasturing upon bears, rein-deer, and raw frozen fish, the latter of which he considered a great delicacy.

BOOK-SHAPED WATCH.

The unique curiosity, of which the annexed is an accurate representation, was one of the choicest rarities of the Bernal collection, and

is, therefore, highly appropriate to our pages. It once belonged to, and was made for, Bogislaus XIV., Duke of Pomerania, in the time of Gustavus Adolphus. On the dial-side there is an engraved inscription of the Duke and his titles, with the date 1627, and the engraving of his armorial bearings; on the back of the case there are engraved two male portraits, buildings, &c.; the dial-plate is of silver, chased in relief; the insides are chased with birds and foliage. This watch has apparently two separate movements, and a large bell; at the back, over the bell, the metal is ornamentally pierced in a circle, with a dragon and other devices, and the sides are

pierced and engraved in scrolls. It bears the maker's name, "Dionistus Hessichti."

THE RULING PASSION.

Mr. Henry Stribling, farmer, who died at Goodleigh, near Barnstaple, August 1st, 1800, in the eightieth year of his age, was one of the greatest fox-hunters in Devonshire, and had collected such a number of foxes pads, all of which he had himself cut off when in at the death, that they entirely covered his stable door and door-posts. At his own particular request, a pad was placed in each of his hands in his coffin, and he was attended to the grave by the huntsmen and whippers-in of the packs with which he had hunted.

EDICTS AGAINST FIDDLERS.

An idea may be formed of the strictness with which all popular amusements were prohibited when the Puritans had the ascendancy, from the fact that in 1656-7 Oliver Cromwell prohibited all persons called fiddlers or minstrels from playing, fiddling, or making music in any inn, ale-house,

or tavern, &c. If they proffered themselves or offered to make music, they were to be adjudged to be rogues, vagabonds, and sturdy vagabonds, and were to be proceeded against as such.

SCENE OF DESOLATION.

The pass of Keim-an-eigh is one of the numerous wonders of nature. It is situated on the road from Macroom to Bantry, in the county of

Cork, and winds through a deep and narrow rocky defile, about two English miles in length. Its name means, in Irish, "The Path of the Deer." Perhaps, in no part of the kingdom, is there to be found a place so utterly desolate and gloomy. A mountain has been divided by some convulsion of nature, and the narrow pass is overhung on either side, as seen in our engraving, by perpendicular cliffs clothed in wild ivy and underwood, with, occasionally, a stunted yew-tree or arbutus growing among them. At every step advance seems impossible-some huge rock jutting out into the path, or sweeping round it, seeming to conduct only to some barrier still more insurmountable; while from all sides

rush down the "wild fountains,” and forming for themselves a rugged channel, make their way onward, the first tributary to the gentle and fruitful Lee. Nowhere has Nature assumed a more apalling aspect, or manifested a more stern resolve to dwell in her own loneliness and grandeur, undisturbed by any living thing; for even the birds seem to shun a solitude so awful, and the hum of bee or chirp of grasshopper is never heard within its precincts.

THE FIRST ENGLISH NUN.

Face, widow of Edwin, king of Northumberland, is said to have been the first English nun; and the first nunnery in England appears to have been at Barking, in Essex, which was founded by Erkenwald, Bishop of London, wherein he placed a number of Benedictine or black nuns. The most rigid nuns are those of St. Clara, of the order of St. Francis, both of which individuals were born and lived in the same town: the nuns are called poor Clares, and both they and the monks wear grey clothes. Abbesses had formerly seats in parliament. In one, held in 694, says Spelman, they sat and deliberated, and several of them subscribed the decrees made in it. They sat, says Ingulphus, in a parliament held in 855. In the reigns of Henry III. and Edward I. four of them were summoned to a national council, viz. those of Shaftsbury, Barking, Winchester, and Wilton.

PRESENCE OF MIND-ESCAPE FROM A TIGER.

In 1812, a party of British naval and military officers were dining in a jungle at some distance from Madras, when a ferocious tiger rushed in among them, seized a young midshipman, and flung him across his back. In the first emotion of terror, the other officers had all snatched up their arms, and retired some paces from their assailant, who stood lashing his sides with his tail, as if doubtful whether he should seize more prey, or retire with that which he had already secured. They knew that it is usual with the tiger, before he seizes his prey, to deprive it of life, by a pat on the head, which generally breaks the skull; but this is not his invariable practice. The little midshipman lay motionless on the back of his enemy; but yet the officers, who were uncertain whether he had received the mortal pat or not, were afraid to fire, lest they should kill him together with the tiger. While in this state of suspense, they perceived the hand of the youth gently move over the side of the animal, and conceiving the motion to result from the convulsive throbs of death, they were about to fire, when, to their utter astonishment, the tiger dropped stone dead; and their young friend sprung from the carcass, waving in triumph a bloody dirk drawn from the heart, for which he had been feeling with the utmost coolness and circumspection, when the motion of his hand had been taken for a dying spasm.

COST OF ARTICLES IN THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY.

The following article is taken from Martin's History of Thetford. It is copied from an original record in that borough, when John le Forester was mayor, in the tenth year of Edward the Third, A.D. 1336. It is so

far curious, as it exhibits an authentic account of the value of many articles at that time; being a bill, inserted in the town book, of the expenses attending the sending two light-horsemen from Thetford to the army, which was to march against the Scots that year.

To two men chosen to go into the army against Scotland
For cloth, and to the tailor for making it into two gowns
For two pair of gloves, and a stick or staff.
For two horses..

For shoeing these horses

For two pair of boots for the light-horsemen

Paid to a lad for going with the mayor to Lenn (Lynn), to take care of the horses (the distance between Thetford and Lynn is 53 miles.

To a boy for a letter at Lenn (viz., carrying it thither) Expenses for the horses of two light-horsemen for four days before they departed ..

66

£ s. d.

1

0 0

6 11

0 0 2

1 15 0 0 0 4 028

LAW AND ORDER IN THE STREETS OF LONDON IN 1733. What an extraordinary state of things does the following extract from the Weekly Register of December 8th, 1733, disclose! The stages and hackney-coaches actually made open war upon private carriages. "The drivers," says the paragraph, are commissioned by their masters to annoy, sink, and destroy all the single and double horse-chaises they can conveniently meet with, or overtake in their way, without regard to the lives or limbs of the persons who travel in them. What havoc these industrious sons of blood and wounds have made within twenty miles of London in the compass of a summer's season, is best known by the articles of accidents in the newspapers: the miserable shrieks of women and children not being sufficient to deter the villains from doing what they call their duty to their masters; for besides their daily or weekly wages, they have an extraordinary stated allowance for every chaise they can reverse, ditch, or bring by the road, as the term or phrase is.” Verily, we who live in the present day have reason to rejoice that in some things there is a decided improvement upon "the good old times."

NEVER SLEEPING IN A BED.

Christopher Pivett, of the city of York, died 1796, aged 93. He was a carver and gilder by trade; but during the early part of his life served in the army, and was in the retinue of the Duke of Cumberland, under whose command he took part in the battle of Fontenoy, as he did at the battle of Dettingen under the Earl of Stair; he was likewise at the siege of Carlisle, and the great fight of Culloden. His house, after he had settled at York, being accidentally burnt down, he formed the singular resolution of never again sleeping in a bed, lest he should be burned to death whilst asleep, or not have time sufficient, should such a misfortune again befall him, to remove his property; and this resolution he rigidly acted upon during the last forty years of his life. His practice was to repose upon the floor, or on two chairs, or sitting in a chair, but always

with his clothes on. During the whole of this period he lived entirely alone, cooked his own victuals, and seldom admitted any one into his habitation: nor would he ever disclose to any the place of his birth, or to whom he was related. He had many singularities, but possessed, politically as well as socially, a laudable spirit of independence, which he boldly manifested on several trying occasions. Among other uncommon articles which composed the furniture of his dwelling, was a human skull, which he left strict injunctions should be interred with him.

AMULET BROTCHE.

The subjoined engraving represents an ancient Gaelic Brotche, which was made in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, and once belonged to a Highland Chief, Maclean of Lochbuy in the Isle of Mull, being formed of silver found on his estate. It is of circular form, scolloped, and surrounded by small upright obelisks, each set with a pearl at top; in the centre is a round crystalline ball, considered a magical gem; the top may be taken off, showing a hollow, originally for reliques. On the reverse side of the brotche are engraved the names of the three kings of Cologne, with the word consummation. It was probably a consecrated brotche, and worn not only for the purpose of fastening the dress, but as an amulet.