house, and another adjoining to it, which are now (October, 1737),
actually repairing for his town residence; Carlton House being too
small for that purpose."
THE MORAYSHIRE FLOODS.
[Illustration: [++] The Morayshire Floods.]
In the month of August, 1829, the province of Moray and adjoining
districts were visited by a tremendous flood. Its ravages were most
destructive along the course of those rivers which have their source
in the Cairngorm mountains. The waters of the Findhorn and the Spey,
and their tributaries, rose to an unexampled height. In some parts
of their course these streams rose fifty feet above their natural
level. Many houses were laid desolate, much agricultural produce
was destroyed, and several lives were lost. The woodcut in our text
represents the situation of a boatman called Sandy Smith, and his
family, in the plains of Forres. "They were huddled together," says
the eloquent historian of the Floods, "on a spot of ground a few feet
square, some forty or fifty yards below their inundated dwelling. Sandy
was sometimes standing and sometimes sitting on a small cask, and, as
the beholders fancied, watching with intense anxiety the progress of
the flood, and trembling for every large tree that it brought sweeping
past them. His wife, covered with a blanket, sat shivering on a bit of
a log, one child in her lap, and a girl of about seventeen, and a boy
of about twelve years of age, leaning against her side. A bottle and
a glass on the ground, near the man, gave the spectators, as it had
doubtless given him, some degree of comfort. About a score of sheep
were standing around, or wading or swimming in the shallows. Three cows
and a small horse, picking at a broken rick of straw that seemed to be
half-afloat, were also grouped with the family." The account of the
rescue of the sufferers is given with a powerful dramatic effect, but
we cannot afford space for the quotation. The courageous adventurers
who manned the boat for this dangerous enterprise, after being
carried over a cataract, which overwhelmed their boat, caught hold
of a floating hay-cock, to which they clung till it stuck among some
young alder-trees. Each of them then grasping a bough, they supported
themselves for two hours among the weak and brittle branches. They
afterwards recovered the boat under circumstances almost miraculous,
and finally succeeded in rescuing Sandy and his family from their
perilous situation.
TREATMENT AND CONDITION OF WOMEN IN FORMER TIMES.
From the subversion of the Roman Empire, to the fourteenth or fifteenth
century, women spent most of their time alone, almost entire strangers
to the joys of social life; they seldom went abroad, but to be
spectators of such public diversions and amusements as the fashions of
the times countenanced. Francis I. was the first who introduced women
on public days to Court; before his time nothing was to be seen at
any of the Courts of Europe, but grey-bearded politicians, plotting
the destruction of the rights and liberties of mankind, and warriors
clad in complete armour, ready to put their plots in execution. In
the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries elegance had scarcely any
existence, and even cleanliness was hardly considered as laudable. The
use of linen was not known; and the most delicate of the fair sex wore
woollen shifts. In Paris they had meat only three times a week; and
one hundred livres, (about five pounds sterling,) was a large portion
for a young lady. The better sort of citizens used splinters of wood
and rags dipped in oil, instead of candles, which, in those days,
were a rarity hardly to be met with. Wine was only to be had at the
shops of the Apothecaries, where it was sold as a cordial; and to ride
in a two-wheeled cart, along the dirty rugged streets, was reckoned
a grandeur of so enviable a nature, that Philip the Fair prohibited
the wives of citizens from enjoying it. In the time of Henry VIII. of
England, the peers of the realm carried their wives behind them on
horseback, when they went to London; and in the same manner took them
back to their country seats with hoods of waxed linen over their heads,
and wrapped in mantles of cloth to secure them from the cold.
HOMER IN A NUTSHELL.
Huet, Bishop of Avranches, thus writes in his autobiography:--"When
his Highness the Dauphin was one day confined to his bed by a slight
illness, and we who stood round were endeavouring to entertain him by
pleasant conversation, mention was by chance made of the person who
boasted that he had written Homer's Iliad in characters so minute,
that the whole could be enclosed in a walnut shell. This appearing
incredible to many of the company, I contended not only that it might
be done, but that I could do it. As they expressed their astonishment
at this assertion, that I might not be suspected of idle boasting, I
immediately put it to the proof. I therefore took the fourth part of
a common leaf of paper, and on its narrower side wrote a single line
in so small a character that it contained twenty verses of the Iliad:
of such lines each page of the paper could easily admit 120, therefore
the page would contain 2400 Homeric verses: and as the leaf so divided
would give eight pages it would afford room for above 19,000 verses,
whereas the whole number in the Iliad does not exceed 17,000. Thus by
my single line I demonstrated my proposition."
AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF CHARING CROSS AND CHEAPSIDE CROSS.
The following interesting "Autobiographies" of the Old London Crosses,
are extracted from Henry Peacham's _Dialogue between the Crosse in
Cheap and Charing Cross, confronting each other, as fearing their fall
in these uncertaine times_, four leaves, 4to. 1641.
"_Charing Cross._--I am made all of white marble (which is not
perceived of euery one) and so cemented with mortar made of the purest
lime, Callis sand, whites of eggs and the strongest wort, that I defie
all hatchets and hammers whatsoever. In King Henry the Eighth's daies
I was begged, and should have been degraded for that I had:--Then in
Edward the Sixe, when Somerset-house was building, I was in danger;
after that, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, one of her footmen had
like to have run away with me; but the greatest danger of all I was in,
when I quak'd for fear, was in the time of King James, for I was eight
times begged:--part of me was bespoken to make a kitchen chimney for a
chiefe constable in Shoreditch; an inn-keeper in Holborn had bargained
for as much of me as would make two troughes, one to stand under a
pumpe to water his guests' horses, and the other to give his swine
their meate in; the rest of my poore carcase should have been carried
I know not whither to the repaire of a decayed stone bridge (as I was
told) on the top of Harrow-hill. Our royall forefather and founder,
King Edward the First you know, built our sister crosses, Lincolne,
Granthame, Woburne, Northampton, Stonie-Stratford, Dunstable, Saint
Albanes, and ourselves here in London, in the 21st yeare of his raigne,
in the yeare 1289."
"_Cheapside Cross._--After this most valiant and excellent king had
built me in forme, answerable in beauty and proportion to the rest,
I fell to decay, at which time one John Hatherley, maior of London,
having first obtained a licence of King Henry the Sixt, anno 1441, I
was repaired in a beautiful manner. John Fisher, a mercer, after that
gave 600 markes to my new erecting or building, which was finished
anno 1484, and after in the second yeare of Henry the Eighth, I was
gilded over against the coming in of Charles the Fift Emperor, and
newly then gilded against the coronation of King Edward the Sixt, and
gilded againe anno 1554, against the coronation of King Philip. Lord,
how often have I been presented by juries of the quest for incombrance
of the street, and hindring of cartes and carriages, yet I have kept my
standing; I shall never forget how upon the 21st of June, anno 1581,
my lower statues were in the night with ropes pulled and rent down, as
in the resurrection of Christ--the image of the Virgin Mary, Edward
the Confessor, and the rest. Then arose many divisions and new sects
formerly unheard of, as Martin Marprelate, _alias_ Penrie, Browne, and
sundry others, as the chronicle will inform you. My crosse should have
been taken quite away, and a _Piramis_ errected in the place, but Queen
Elizabeth (that queen of blessed memory) commanded some of her privie
councell, in her Majesties name, to write unto Sir Nicholas Mosely,
then Maior, to have me againe repaired with a crosse; yet for all this
I stood bare for a yeare or two after: Her Highness being very angry,
sent expresse word she would not endure their contempt, but expressly
commanded forthwith the crosse should be set up, and sent a strict
command to Sir William Rider, Lord Maior, and bade him to respect my
antiquity; for that is the ancient ensigne of Christianity, &c. This
letter was dated December 24, anno 1600. Last of all I was marvellously
beautified and adorned against the comming in of King James, and
fenced about with sharp pointed barres of iron, against the rude and
villainous hands of such as upon condition as they might have the
pulling me down, would be bound to rifle all Cheapside."
It is scarcely necessary to say that both crosses have long since
disappeared, and their sites become uncertain, although the name of
Charing Cross still distinguishes an important London district.
SOMETHING LIKE A FEAST.
Leland mentions a feast given by the Archbishop of York, at his
installation, in the reign of Edward IV. The following is a
specimen:--300 quarters of wheat, 300 tuns of ale, 100 tuns of wine,
1,000 sheep, 104 oxen, 304 calves, 304 swine, 2,000 geese, 1,000
capons, 2,000 pigs, 400 swans, 104 peacocks, 1,500 hot venison pasties,
4,000 cold, 5,000 custards hot and cold. Such entertainments are a
picture of manners.
EGYPTIAN TOYS IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM.
The truth of the old proverb, that "there is nothing new under the
sun," will be recognised on an examination of the interesting group
which forms the subject of our engraving. Here are dolls of different
shapes, some of them for good children, and some, perhaps, for bad;
foot-balls, covered with leather, &c., the stitches in parts still
firmly adhering; models of fishes and fruit; and round pellets, which
the "small boys" of the present day would call "marbles." These toys
have been played with by little Egyptians who have been dead and buried
three or four thousand years.
Many of the toys that hold places in the English and other markets
are, so far as fashion is concerned, of considerable antiquity, having
been made, without any alteration in pattern, by certain families for
several generations. In the mountainous districts of the Savoy and
Switzerland, large numbers, both of children and grown persons, are
constantly employed in the manufacture of Noah's-arks, milkmaids &c.
Some of the animals carved in wood, and sold here for small prices,
show considerable skill in the imitation of the forms of nature, and
could only be produced at their present cost, owing to the cheapness of
living in those districts, and to the systematic division of labour.
[Illustration: [++] Egyptian Toys.]
Near the birthplace of Prince Albert is a very large manufactory of
military toys, such as drums, trumpets, helmets, &c.; and in parts of
Holland--
"----The children take pleasure in making
What the children of England take pleasure in breaking."
THE PYRAMIDS OF EGYPT.
The Pyramids of Egypt, especially the two largest of the Pyramids of
Jizeh, are the most stupendous masses of building, in stone, that human
labour has ever been known to accomplish. The Egyptian Pyramids, of
which, large and small, and in different states of preservation, the
number is very considerable, are all situated on the west side of the
Nile, and they extend, in an irregular line, and in groups, at some
distance from each other, from the neighbourhood of Jizeh, in 30 deg. N.
lat. as far south as 29 deg. N. lat., a length of between 60 and 70 miles.
All the Pyramids have square bases, and their sides face the cardinal
points.
[Illustration: [++] Pyramids of Jizeh.]
The Pyramids of Jizeh are nearly opposite to Cairo. They stand on a
plateau or terrace of limestone, which is a projection from the Libyan
mountain-chain. The surface of the terrace is barren and irregular,
and is covered with sand and small fragments of rock; its height,
measured from the base of the Great Pyramids, is 164 feet above the
Nile in its low state, taken at an average of the years 1798 to 1801.
The north-east angle of the Great Pyramid is 1700 yards from the canal
which runs between the terrace and the Nile, and about five miles from
the Nile itself.
Herodotus was informed by the priests of Memphis that the Great Pyramid
was built by Cheops, King of Egypt, about 900 B. C., or about 450 years
before Herodotus visited Egypt. He says that 100,000 men were employed
twenty years in building it, and that the body of Cheops was placed
in a room beneath the bottom of the Pyramid, surrounded by a vault
to which the waters of the Nile were conveyed through a subterranean
tunnel. A chamber under the centre of the Pyramid has indeed been
discovered, but it does not appear to be the tomb of Cheops. It is
about 56 feet above the low-water level of the Nile. The second Pyramid
was built, Herodotus says, by Cephren, or Cephrenes, the brother and
successor of Cheops; and the third by Mycerinus, the son of Cheops.
TEST OF COURAGE IN A CHILD.
In the education of their children, the Anglo-Saxons only sought to
render them dauntless and apt for the two most important occupations
of their future lives--war and the chase. It was a usual trial of a
child's courage, to place him on the sloping roof of a building, and
if, without screaming or terror he held fast, he was styled a stout
herce, or brave boy.--_Howel._
EXECUTION OF RAVILLIAC, WHO ASSASSINATED HENRY THE FOURTH OF FRANCE.
The scene is thus described in a volume published in 1728:--
"This Francis Ravilliac was born in Angoulesme, by profession a lawyer,
who, after the committing of that horrid fact, being seized and put
upon the rack, May 27; the 25th he had sentence of death passed on him,
and was executed accordingly in the manner following. He was brought
out of prison in his shirt, with a torch of two pound weight lighted in
one hand, and the knife wherewith he murdered the king chained to the
other; he was then set upright in a dung-cart, wherein he was carried
to the greve or place of execution, where a strong scaffold was built;
at his coming upon the scaffold he crossed himself, a sign that he dyed
a Papist; then he was bound to an engine of wood made like St. Andrew's
cross; which done, his hand with the knife chained to it was put into
a furnace, then flaming with fire and brimstone, wherein it was in a
most terrible manner consumed, at which he cast forth horrible cries
yet would he not confess any thing; after which the executioner having
made pincers red hot in the same furnace, they did pinch the brawn of
his arms and thighs, the calves of his legs, with other fleshy parts of
his body, then they poured into the wounds scalding oil, rosin, pitch,
and brimstone melted together; but to make the last act of his tragedy
equal in torments to the rest, they caused four strong horses to be
brought to tear his body in pieces, where being ready to suffer his
last torment, he was again questioned, but would not reveal any thing,
and so died without calling upon God, or speaking one word concerning
Heaven: his flesh and joints were so strongly knit together, that
these four horses could not in a long time dismember him, but one of
them fainting, a gentleman who was present, mounted upon a mighty
strong horse, alighted, and tyed him to one of the wretch's limbs, yet
for all this they were constrained to cut the flesh under his arms
and thighs with a sharp razor, whereby his body was the easier torn
in pieces; which done, the fury of the people was so great, that they
pulled his dismembered carcass out of the executioner's hands, which
they dragged up and down the dirt, and, cutting off the flesh with
their knives, the bones which remained were brought to the place of
execution, and there burnt, the ashes were cast in the wind, being
judged unworthy of the earth's burial; by the same sentence all his
goods were forfeited to the king. It was also ordained that the house
where he had been born should be beaten down, a recompence being given
the owner thereof, and never any house to be built again upon that
ground; that within fifteen days after the publication of the sentence,
by sound of trumpet in the town of Angoulesme, his father and mother
should depart the realm, never to return again; if they did, to be
hanged up presently: his brethren, sisters, and other kindred were
forbidden to carry the name of Ravilliac, but to take some other, and
the substitute of the king's attorney-general had charge to see the
execution of the sentence at his peril."
KNIVES AND FORKS.
"In all ancient pictures of Eating, &c. knives are seen in the hands of
the guests, but _no Forks_."--_Turner's Saxons._
"Here I will mention a thing," says Coryat in his 'Crudities,' "that
might have been spoken of before in the discourse of the first Italian
toun. I obserued a custome in all those Italian cities and townes
through which I passed, that is not vsed in any other country that
I saw in my traules, neither doe I think that any other nation of
Christendome doth vse it, but only Italy. The Italians, and also most
strangers that are commorant in Italy, doe alwaies at their meales vse
a _little forke_ when they cut their meate. For while with their knife,
which they hold in one hand, they cut their meate out of the dish, they
fasten their forke, which they hold in their other hand, upon the same
dish, so that whatsoever he be that sitting in the company of others at
meate, should vnaduisedly touch the dish of meate with his fingers from
which all at the table doe cut, he will give occasion of offence unto
the company, as hauing transgressed the laws of good manners, in so
much that for his error he shall be at the least broue-beaten, if not
reprehended in words.
This form of feeding, I vnderstand, is generally vsed in all places of
Italy, their forkes being for the most part made of yron or steele, and
some of siluer; but those are used only by gentlemen. The reason of
this their curiosity is, because the Italian cannot by any means indure
to have his dish touched with fingers, seeing all men's fingers are
not alike clean. Hereupon I myself thought good to imitate the Italian
fashion by this forked cutting of meate, not only while I was in Italy,
but also in Germany, and oftentimes in England, since I came home:
being once quipped for that frequent vsing of my forke, by a certain
gentleman, a familiar friend of mine, one Mr. Laurence Whitaker, who
in his merry humour doubted not to call me at table _furcifer_, only
for vsing a forke at feeding, but for no other cause."--_Coryat's
Crudities_, 1611.
Even when Heylin published his Cosmography, (1652,) forks were still a
novelty. See his Third Book, where having spoken of the ivory sticks
used by the Chinese, he adds, "The use of silver forks, which is by
some of our spruce gallants taken up _of late_, came from thence into
Italy, and from thence into England."--_Antiquarian Repertory._
CHINESE PUNISHMENT OF THE KANG OR WOODEN COLLAR.
The Chinese are very quiet and orderly; and no wonder, because they are
afraid of the great bamboo stick.
[Illustration: [++] Kang or Wooden Collar.]
The mandarins (or rulers of towns) often sentence offenders to lie upon
the ground, and to have thirty strokes of the bamboo. But the wooden
collar is worse than the bamboo stick. It is a great piece of wood with
a hole for a man to put his head through. The men in wooden collars are
brought out of their prisons every morning and chained to a wall, where
everybody passing by can see them. They cannot feed themselves in their
wooden collars, because they cannot bring their hands to their mouths;
but sometimes a son may be seen feeding his father, as he stands
chained to the wall. There are men also whose business it is to feed
the prisoners. For great crimes men are strangled or beheaded.
CASCADE DES PELERINES.
[Illustration: [++] Cascade des Pelerines.]
There is a waterfall in Chamouni which no traveller should omit going
to see, called the Cascade des Pelerines. It is one of the most curious
and beautiful scenes in Switzerland. A torrent issues from the Glacier
des Pelerines, high up the mountain, above the Glacier du Bossons, and
descends, by a succession of leaps, in a deep gorge, from precipice
to precipice, almost in one continual cataract; but it is all the
while merely gathering force, and preparing for its last magnificent
deep plunge and recoil of beauty. Springing in one round condensed
column out of the gorge, over a perpendicular cliff, it strikes, at
its fall, with its whole body of water, into a sort of vertical rock
basin, which one would suppose its prodigious velocity and weight would
split into a thousand pieces; but the whole cataract, thus arrested,
at once suddenly rebounds in a parabolic arch, at least sixty feet
into the air; and then, having made this splendid airy curvature,
falls with great noise and beauty into the natural channel below. It
is beyond measure beautiful. It is like the fall of divine grace into
chosen hearts, that send it forth again for the world's refreshment,
in something like such a shower and spray of loveliness, to go winding
its life-giving course afterwards, as still waters in green pastures.
The force of the recoil from the plunge of so large a body of water, at
such a height, is so great, that large stones, thrown into the stream
above the fall, may be heard amidst the din striking into the basin,
and then are instantly seen careering in the arch of flashing waters.
The same is the case with bushes and pieces of wood, which the boys
are always active in throwing in, for the curiosity of visitors, who
stand below, and see each object invariably carried aloft with the
cataract, in its rebounding atmospheric gambols. When the sun is in
the right position, the rainbows play about the fall like the glancing
of supernatural wings, as if angels were taking a shower-bath. If you
have "the head and the legs of a chamois," you may climb entirely above
this magnificent scene, and look out over the cliff right down into the
point where the cataract shoots like the lightning, to be again shot
back in ten thousand branching jets of diamonds.
INTERESTING INCIDENT CONNECTED WITH THE BAROMETER.
In navigation, the barometer has become an important element of
guidance, and a most interesting incident is recounted by Capt. Basil
Hall, indicative of its value in the open sea. While cruising off the
coast of South America, in the Medusa frigate, one day, when within
the tropics, the commander of a brig in company was dining with him.
After dinner, the conversation turned on the natural phenomena of the
region, when Captain Hall's attention was accidentally directed to
the barometer in the state-room where they were seated, and to his
surprise he observed it to evince violent and frequent alteration. His
experience told him to expect bad weather, and he mentioned it to his
friend. His companion, however, only laughed, for the day was splendid
in the extreme, the sun was shining with its utmost brilliance, and
not a cloud specked the deep blue sky above. But Captain Hall was too
uneasy to be satisfied with bare appearances. He hurried his friend to
his ship, and gave immediate directions for shortening the top hamper
of the frigate as speedily as possible. His lieutenants and the men
looked at him in mute surprise, and one or two of the former ventured
to suggest the inutility of the proceeding. The captain, however,
persevered. The sails were furled; the topmasts were struck; in short,
everything that could oppose the wind was made as snug as possible. His
friend, on the contrary, stood in under every sail.