performed by two soprani, a tenor and less did he continue to shout, thrusting three bases, accompanied by the organ, vio- with the point and striking with the edge. lin, and flute. The performance, directed Soon covered with wounds, weakened with by the master of the chapel-royal, was ad- fatigue, his horse threw him, and he was mirable; that of the De Profundis, to seized and disarmed by an eager crowd, which drums and trumpets were added, who did not suspect they were grasping a was no less satisfactory. Then a herald-at- king, but who, seeing a young and handarms as the history of Portugal, whence I some lad, who would fetch a good price in copy all this, assures us, appeared on the the market at Tunis or Algiers, wanted to cathedral steps, and holding up the king's have a share in the capture. They began escutcheon cried: "People, people of Lis- to dispute about him, and were ready to bon, weep for your king! Don Sebastian is come to blows, when an officer cut the no more!" And the people, sobbing and discussion short by felling the prisoner crying, replied: "Let us weep, our king to the ground with his club. The Moors Sebastian is dead!" then, not to lose every thing, stripped off

sue.

*

*

*

*

After this, the populace-who always his clothes, and left him thus. love their princes after their decease- At daybreak one morning he felt his side. began to cry out against the authors of pricked; he moved, and a jackal ran frightthe enterprise; especially against Car- ened away from the repast he had just dinal Henry and the favorite, Alcaçova; tasted. He had again fainted, when he which determined the Spanish party to was again aroused by a second shock. place the former on the throne and to Somebody held him by the hair, while maintain the latter as minister, in the hope something bright glistened over him. It that the mob would wring both their was the sabre of an Arab, who was going necks, and that a good anarchy would en- to cut off his head, to be added to a dozen *others with which his camel was laden. While his faithful soldiers were running On seeing him open his eyes, the speculaaway from the battle field, while people tive son of the desert refrained; he calcu were weeping for his death, and while lated that the sale of a live slave would be they were embalming a corpse made up more profitable than that of a dead man's of two fragments, what had become of the head; so, having ascertained that no bones real Sebastian? In the thickest of the bat- were broken, he placed him, with his servtle, striking about him, and shouting ant's help upon the pannier of heads, and "Courage, friends! courage, children! for- took him to his tent. There, given to the ward, brave Portuguese! he did not per- women's care, his wounds were dressed; ceive that he was advancing quite alone. he was tended and physicked, and began On turning round to look about him, he to recover his senses just at the moment saw himself encompassed by foes without that the people of Lisbon were crying out, one follower to defend him; but none the "Our king Sebastian is dead!"

NO NEW VERSION OF THE BIBLE.-Be-posed, and to receive suggestions from all fore the close of the session, Mr. Heywood persons who may be willing to offer them; moved, according to promise, an address to point out errors of translation, and such to the Crown, praying for the appointment of a royal commission, consisting of learned men well skilled in the original languages of the Holy Scriptures and conversant with modern biblical scholarship, "to consider of such amendments of the authorized version of the Bible as have been already pro

words and phrases as have either changed their meaning or become obsolete in the lapse of time; and to report the amend ments which they may be prepared to recommend." Sir G. Grey opposed the motion, as repugnant to the religious public. The motion was withdrawn.

From the Eclectic Review.

To know life-to see many cities and fore us, but we will point out the fact, nations - fully to comprehend "the pro- that the fashion has lately run that way. per study of mankind," according to Pope's The great novelist and moralist Henry hackneyed line-has been the desire of Fielding, with a sarcastic glance at his every one, saint or sinner, Christian philo- rival Richardson, apologizes for leading sopher, or heathen sage. This knowledge his readers into such low society as that of has many ways of acquirement. An old Parson Adams, of the Philosopher Square, gentlemanly pagan, whose litter was, some of Mrs. Slipslop, of Partridge and Fanny; eighteen hundred years ago, as well ap- and tells them that he will hereafter regale pointed in Rome, as any young nobleman's them with the conversation of lords. But brougham in London now, tells us that he since then the tide has turned, and the who has seen many towns and peoples and works of fiction may now be almost didivers sorts of men, may be expected to vided into two classes, namely, those which have seen some "life." We moderns, al- deal almost exclusively with the joys and though we have barely time "just to look sorrows of the rich, and those which culabout us and to die," find his advice very tivate solely the society of the poor; and palatable. From the days of my Lord Du- the latter, showing us the horrible abodes, berly and his tutor, Doctor Pangloss, to the troubles, the miseries of these Arabs the present day, scions of the wealthier of modern life, have been, and are, possiclasses, accompanied by their college tu- bly the most numerous and influential. tor, jog on the grand tour of Europe to But there is one essential difference be

see

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life." The shop-boy, freed from his tween these works and those which head chain for one or two days, steals off on a the present article. They are works cheap trip; the citizen runs down into the of fiction; ours, of truth. They, although provinces; the countryman comes up to true and faithful copies, are drawn by men town-all bent on the same purpose; and for of imagination; ours are but bare records those who cannot travel bodily, a couple of of life. They are as true as our own, but newspapers and innumerable books carry being the works of professed fictionists, on the instructive lesson, all more or less they are not fully credited. "Do you bequalified-all eager to proffer the never sa- lieve, Mr. ," said a lady very serioustisfying draught-all ready to offer the ly to us, "Do you believe the poor are so fruit-apples of the Dead Sea, so beautiful very miserable as Dickens draws them? to look at, so bitter to the taste, dust and There must be some exaggeration." There ashes in the mouth-the knowledge of life." are thousands who think as that lady did; To this passion it is our present inten- but we hope that in calmly considering tion to minister. As we are told by the this paper, drawn not more from books Apostle Paul to "mind not high things, than from experience, that many will alter but condescend to men of low estate," so their opinions.

we now propose to glance at the "low life" Mr. Mayhew, in the commencement of a of London. In doing so we are quite aware work, which of all others should require that we are not entering either upon a new the best arrangement, and which without or an unexplored region. We will not it is most thoroughly and cruelly diffuse, only readily own that others have been be- quotes a French mot of M. Horace Say, Londres n'est plus une ville, c'est une province couverte de maisons ;" and the *The Great World of London. By Henry May-mot is both brilliant and true, but it does hew. Bogue. 1856. not convey the whole truth, as Mr. Mayhew shows us.

London Labor and the London Poor. Author. Geo. Newbold. 1856.

VOL. XXXIX.-NO. II.

Same

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comes "ken," a house, or "ruffin," the devil? Many are North-country words which are derived from the Danish; others are merely the symbol used instead of the name, thus, "stampers," are shoes; “darkman," the night; "bleater," mutton or sheep, and so on.

"Again, we have the 'Coster slang,' or the language used by the costermongers, and which consists merely in pronouncing each word as if it were spelt backwards: 'I say, Curly, will you do a top of reeb (pot of beer)?' one costermonger may say to the other. 'It's on doog, Whelkey, on doog (no good, no good),' the second may reply. I've had a reg'lar trosena (bad sort) today. I've been doing dab (bad) with my tol (lot, or stock)-ha'n't made a yennep (penny), s'elp me.' Why, I've cleared a flatch-enore (half-a-crown) a'ready,' Master Whelkey will answer perhaps. But kool the esilop (look at the police); kool him (look at him) Curly! Nommus! (be off). I'm going to do the tight-A magistrate in London is very much like

ner (have my dinner).'

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Lastly, comes the veritable slang, or English argot, i.e., the secret language used by the London thieves. This is made up, in a great degree, of the medieval Latin in which the church service was formerly chanted, and which indeed gave rise to the term 'cant' (from the Latin cantare,) it having been the custom of the ancient beggars to intone' their prayers when asking for alms. 'Can you roker Romay (can you speak cant)?' one individual 'on the cross' will say to another, who is not exactly on the square;' and if the reply be in the affirmative, he will probably add- What is your monekeer (name)?—Where do you stall to in the huey (where do you lodge in the town?' Oh, I drop the main toper (get out of the highroad,' would doubtless be the answer, and slink into the ken (lodging-house) in the back drum (street).' 'Will you have a shanto' gatter (pot of beer) after all this dowry of parny (lot of rain)? I've got a teviss (shilling) left in my clye (pocket).''

6

The utility of this kind of knowledge to the clergyman, to the city missionary, and to the police magistrate, and the power which it gives them over the populace who use these dialects, will be readily perceived.

his brother in India if he do not thoroughly understand the vernacular of the people over whom he presides; many of those, however, who sit upon the bench have distinguished themselves in this kind of learning, and we have heard one of the swell-mob declare of one ornament to the magistracy, that he "could patter flash like an angel," i. e., that he could speak to thieves in their own peculiar tongue.

But "low life" in London does not alone affect the tongue and the habits of the people; it stretches farther than that; it has its effects, not only upon this life, but upon that which is to come; with all the exertions which the various religious bodies, and the Church of England have made-and in this excellent work we wish not to put one before the other-not only is Christianity not thoroughly known, but four years ago only, a writer, who had spent a greater portion of his life in preachWe greatly doubt Mr. Mayhew's deri- ing the Gospel to the poor, declared that, vation of "cant." Johnson derives it from "Heathenism is the poor man's religion the word "quaint," which is, we think, in the metropolis." "It is well," he writes, farther from the truth than Mayhew. Cer-"for some to declare that the Church of tain, however, it is that the words now used as cant terms, are very old, and were well known, not only in Dr. Johnson's and in Swift's and Pope's days, but in those of Shakspeare and Ben Jonson. At the end of Richard Broome's "Merry Beggars," there is a glossary of cant terms, all of which are now used. From Jonson's "Bartholomew Fair," and from one or two other works of the elder dramatists, this kind of knowledge may be gleaned. Dick Broome, it will be remembered, was a servant and pupil of "Rare Ben Jonson," and as Ben had served as a common soldier and a bricklayer's laborer, he no doubt used his terms from real knowledge. That portions of the language may be derived from the Latin is very probable, thus: pannum" is bread (panis), and "patrico" is their priest (pater, a father), but whence

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England is the poor man's church, and for others to speak of Methodism as the poor man's religion, but neither of these statements is true;" and he goes on further to show, that in 1841, in the Island of Jamaica, out of a population of 380,000 souls, Beg-maica, there were more communicants than in London, out of a population of 2,103,279; and further that, nothwithstanding late efforts the enemy having been still busier than we-infidelity is rather on the increase than the decrease; to which sad state of things, the desecration of the Sabbath by the government will give a stimulant rather than a stoppage.

To one portion of the "low life" of London, that portion which "coins its soul for drachmas," and pays down its nightly portion of sin for its morrow's bread, we can only here allude; but that indeed is

a subject which should be thoroughly looked to, which no squeamishness should debar good men from examining, and which is alarmingly on the increase; one authority on the subject has placed the number of the class we allude to, either totally professional, or occasional, at the immensely high figure of 150,000 in London alone! If we could only for a few moments attentively meditate upon this fact, we should indeed be struck with the amount of misery which must daily and nightly take place in the mighty mothercity, the modern Babylon the Great!

The occupations and the amusements of the people have an immense effect upon their morals. One cause of the sin of great cities, is the immense amount of labor which is performed in them. Those philosophers who talk, and talk truly, about idleness being the mother of all the vices, and the injusta noverca, the step-mother of all the virtues, are quite right in their theory, but they have strained it too far, and like an ambitious vaulter, their plan "o'erleaps itself, and falls o' the t'other side." Not having decent leisure, having no time for the gentler affections and for self-cultivation, the worker in the towns runs into dissipation, and takes eagerly any amusement which is offered to him. This, competition amongst the caterers and the vicious state of society have rendered exciting, piquant, and exhilarating, as one of those observers upon whose books we build this article, shall show

piano, and bawl for the singers. The chairman, who sits at the foot of the raised stage with a transparency, and some slight attempt at scenery comic singer enters. He is a heavy, gross man, behind it, raps heavily upon the floor, and the of some celebrity no doubt before he came here, for he takes all sorts of familiar liberties with his audience. His face is absolutely purple upon all prominent parts, and his nose and thick lips, inflamed with disease, wear the livery of that spirit he has so constantly worshipped. In the same cause, no doubt, his voice has become like the grand piano-all the higher notes are worn out, and but one continuous bawl of thunder remains. Strike up, Mr. Vox, and bawl your worst; you have your audience cultivated to your taste. Mr. Vox does strike up. He is fashionably dressed in glossy black; but by buttoning up his coat, raising his shoulders, and hiding every vestige of linen, powerfully aided he transforms himself into a vagabond upon the by his countenance and a very old shabby hat, shortest notice, and bawls out the newest balderdash to the oldest tune. At every hit in the song, political or otherwise, the tavern lovers turn to explain to their tavern sweethearts, and the mothers jump and dandle their babies to the tune. Mr. Vox has, as a matter of course, an angcore'-so says the chairman-Mr. Vox will sing again. Retiring for a moment behind the shirt-front and red face, and sings that which Mr. Vox comes back with snowy he had better have left unuttered. The girls titter, and the men grin, and the babies are still dandled to the tune, and the reeking air, divided by Mr. Vox's breath, goes up against the skylights of the room, secking to pollute heaven by its corruptness.

transparency,

"After another encore, Mr. Vox gives way to satinet and mosaic jewellery the height of fasha young lady, who appears to think scarlet ion. She sweeps in with a piece of music in her hands, although, as she evidently does not know a bar of it, and has sung the song some fifty times before, one cannot tell why she holds it.

Miss Quaver will oblige,' says the chairman. Miss Quaver does oblige. Her mother won't let her marry.' You see how it is, such a fine lady as she is! how pert the girls think her, and what a duchess the young gentlemen imagine her. Poor thing! the scarlet satinet has done her service in every concert room in London.

"A grand concert, gentlemen, every nightadmission twopence, reserved seats sixpence. Bang, twang, and bang, goes the grand piano, that brilliant performer, Mr. Minim, having dropped his heavy fingers upon it, and the occupants of the bar rush through the door which admits them, to the body of the concert room. A few critical persons and many ladies (?) ascend the twisted stairs, and from the gallery, dignified into the name of the reserved seats, "Night grows on apace. The gentlemen, look on. Mr. Minim still continues playing. obedient to the pot-boy's call, give him more How the body of the hall is crowded! Hus- 'orders.' The babies fall asleep, or squall in bands with their wives and babies too; sweet- concert with the singers. The young ladies lose hearts of the daughters thus brought up, who what little modesty they had. Mr. Vox gets offer to the lady a pint pot, with the feelings if not more bold and more blatant, and the round of the grace of an exquisite in another grade of entertainment-which includes Mr. Vox dressed life offering a bouquet. Waiters dodge about as a wagoner, Miss Quaver with a straw hat the forms, and tell the gentlemen in a peremp-on as a young lady from the country, another tory tone to 'give their orders.' The gentlemen do, and steaming glasses of the worst spirits are brought in, and placed carefully upon the ledge which runs at the back of each seat.

"The connoiseurs of the audience are getting tired of Mr. Minim's thumps upon the worn-out

young lady with a Scotch name in a Highland fling, and the whole strength of the company in an opening chorus of some favorite operafinishes at last. Twelve o'clock, gentlemen. It is Saturday night.' Pour out into the streets and shut the doors upon them, as disorganized