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developed among us, would delight to wield on our behalf, its energies unfettered, and toil unimpeded for the national prosperity; new enterprize would inspirit the capitalist; while the humble artificer at the forge would learn the tidings with satisfaction,

"Relax his ponderous strength, and lean to hear."

Something too much of this. But I have felt it incumbent on me to place on record my honest conviction of the impolicy of the tax itself, and of the still greater enormity of the evil which it goes to support. To return to my own history.

In this "hospital," which was the first alma mater of my juvenile days, I graduated in all the science of the young gipsies who swarmed around me. My health, which was naturally robust, bore up against the fearful odds of mortality by which I was beset; and although I should have ultimately, no doubt, perished with the crowd of infant sufferers that shared my evil destiny, still, like that favoured Grecian who won the good graces of Polyphemus in his anthropophagous cavern, a signal privilege would perhaps have been granted me: Prout would have been the last to be devoured.

But a ray of light broke into my prison-house. The idea of escape, a bold thought! took possession of my soul. Yet how to accomplish so daring an enterprise? how elude the vigilance of the fat door-keeper, and the keen eye of the chaplain? Right well did they know the muster-roll of their stock of urchins, and often verified the same:

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'Bisque die numerant ambo pecus, alter et hædos." Heaven, however, soon granted what the porter denied. The milkman from Watergrasshill, who brought the supplies every morn and eve, prided himself particularly on the size and beauty of his churn,-a capacious wooden recipient which my young eye admired with more than superficial curiosity. Having accidentally got on the wagon, and explored the capacious hollow of the machine, a bright angel whispered in my ear to secrete myself in the cavity. I did so; and shortly after, the gates of the hospital were flung wide for my egress and I found myself jogging onward on

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the high road to light and freedom! Judge of my seusations! Milton has sung of one who, "long in populous city pent," makes a visit to Highgate, and, snuffing the rural breeze, blesses the country air: my rapture was of a nature that defies description. To be sure, it was one of the most boisterous days of storm and tempest that ever vexed the heavens ; but secure in the churn, I chuckled with joy, and towards evening fell fast asleep. In my subsequent life I have often dwelt with pleasure on that joyous escape; and when in my course of studies I met with the following beautiful elegy of Simonides, I could not help applying it to myself, and translated it accordingly. There have been versions by Denman, the Queen's solicitor;* by Elton, by W. Hay, and by Doctor Jortin, but I prefer my own, as more literai and moro conformable to genuine Greek simplicity.

The Lament of Danae.

By Simonides, the elegiac Poet of Cos.

Οτε λαρνακι εν δαιδαλέα, ανεμος
Βρεμε πνέων, κινηθεισα τε λιμνα
Δείματι ήριπεν, ουδ' αδιάντοισι
Παρειαις, αμφι δε Περσει βαλε
Φιλαν χέρα, ειπεν τε· Ω τέκος,
Οἷον εχω πονον· συ δ' αωτεις, γαλαθηνῳ
Ητορι κνώσσεις εν ατερπει δωματι,
Χαλκεογομφῳ δε νυκτιλάμπει
Κυανεῳ τε δνοφῳ· συ δ' αυαλεαν
Υπερθε τεαν κομαν βαθειαν
Παριοντος κυματος ουκ αλέγεις,
Ουδ' ανεμου φθογγων, πορφυρεα
Κειμενος εν χλανίδι, πρόσωπον καλοι.
Ει δε τοι δεινον τογε δεινον ην,
Και κεν εμων ρημάτων λεπτου
Υπειχες ουας· κελομαι, είδε βρεφος,
Εύδετο δε ποντος, εύδετο αμετρον κακον.
Ματαιοβουλια δε τις φάνειη,

Ζεῦ πατερ, εκ σεο· ὁ τι δη θαρσαλεον

Επος, ευχομαι τεκνοφι δικας μοι.

never employed him.-REGINA. 'Twas Caroline of Brunswick.

The Lament of Stella.

By Father Proui.

While round the churn, 'mid sleet and rain,
It blew a perfect hurricane,

Wrapt in slight garment to protect her,
Methought I saw my mother's spectre,
Who took her infant to her breast-
Me, the small tenant of that chest-
While thus she lulled her babe: "How cruel
Have been the Fates to thee, my jewel!
But, caring naught for foe or scoffer,
Thou sleepest in this milky coffer,
Cooper'd with brass hoops weather-tight,
Impervious to the dim moonlight.
The shower cannot get in to soak
Thy hair or little purple cloak;
Heedless of gloom, in dark sojourn,
Thy face illuminates the churn!
Small is thine ear, wee babe, for hearing,
But grant my prayer, ye gods of Erin!
And may folks find that this young fellow
Does credit to his mother Stella."

No. V.

THE ROGUERIES OF TOM MOORE.

From the Prout Papers.

"Grata carpendo thyma per laborem
Plurimum, circa nemus* uvidique
Tiburis ripas, operosa PARVUS
Carmina fingo."

QUINTUS HORATIUS FLACCUS.

"By taking time, and some advice from Prout,
A polish'd book of songs I hammered out;
But still my Muse, for she the fact confesses,
Haunts that sweet hill, renown'd for water-cresses."
THOMAS L. MOORE.

WHEN the star of Father Prout (a genuine son of the ac

i. e. Blarneum nemus.

complished Stella, and in himself the most eccentric luminary that has of late adorned our planetary system) first rose in the firmament of literature, it deservedly attracted the gaze of the learned, and riveted the eye of the sage. We know not what may have been the sensation its appearance created in foreign countries,-at the Observatoire Royal of Paris, in the Val d'Arno, or at Fesolé, where, in Milton's time, the sons of Galileo plied the untiring telescope to descry new heavenly phenomena, "rivers or mountains in the shadowy moon,"-but we can vouch for the impression made on the London University; for all Stinkomalee hath been perplexed at the apparition. The learned Chaldeans of Gower Street opine that it forebodes nothing good to the cause of "useful knowledge," and they watch the "transit" of Prout, devoutly wishing for his "exit." With throbbing anxiety, night after night has Dr. Lardner gazed on the sinister planet, seeking, with the aid of Dr. Babbage's calculating machine, to ascertain the probable period of its final eclipse, and often muttering its name, "to tell how he hates its beams." He has seen it last April shining conspicuously in the constellation of Pisces, when he duly conned over the "Apology for Lent," and the Doctor has reported to the University Board, that, "advancing with retrograde movement in the zodiac," this disastrous orb was last perceived in the milky way, entering the sign of " Amphora," or the churn." But what do the public care, while the general eye is delighted by its irradiance, that a few owls and dunces are scared by its effulgency? The Georgium Sidus, the Astrium Julium, the Soleil d'Austerlitz, the Star at Vauxhall, the Nose of Lord Chancellor Vaux,* and the

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*The following song was a favourite with the celebrated Chancellor 'Aguesseau. It is occasionally sung, in our own times, by a modern performer on the woolsack, in the intervals of business;

"Sitôt que la lumière
Redore nos côteaux,

Je commence ma carrière
Par visiter mes tonneaux.

Ravi de revoir l'aurore,

Le verre en main, je lui dis,
Vois-tu donc plus, chez le Maure,
Que sur mon nez, de rubis?”

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