ings I have ever seen. There are many fine pictures, and pieces of statuary, in the inside. But the bronze doors are the objects most worthy of admiration, and these it is impossible not to admire exceedingly. We cannot help wondering, too, to see how little injury has been suffered by such old buildings, either from time or ill-will. The belfry has the name of Leaning Tower, from its having a considerable inclination to one side. It is in the form of a round tower, is nearly 200 feet high; and its leaning, or departure from the perpendicular line, is full as much as four English yards. Some people, particularly the Pisans, attribute the producing of this curiosity to design in the artist, and would have you believe that it is a miraculously successful prank in architecture; but soberer judges are of opinion that a sinking at the foundation has been the cause. The CampoSanto is a most beautiful and most curious thing. It is a large rectangular building. The interior space is, like any other burying-ground, open to the air. All that of it, indeed, which is under roof, consists in a wide and elegant arcade, which goes, on the inside of the Campo, all the way round the wall. The inner side of the roof is supported by columns, and the outer side rests on the wall. All the inside of the wall is covered with paintings, in fresco, the greater part of which are relating to subjects from Scriptural history. Dante's Inferno is one of the things here handled by the painter; and truly infernal he has made it. Beside the paintings, there are statues in marble, monuments, and tombs. The tomb of Algarotti is here. It is said that the earth contained in the area of the Campo-Santo was actually brought all the way from the Holy Land. This circumstance it is which renders the place so curious. We are told that the earth was brought here by Archbishop Lanfranchi, when he returned from the wars in the Holy Land, which was before the building now called CampoSanto was commenced. This occurred upwards of six hundred years ago. And hence it was that the spot obtained the name of Holy Ground. Some of the fresco paintings here were made more than four hundred years ago. Some parts of them are, it is true, considerably damaged; and restorations have been made of late years. But, what a sign of the climate is this, that most of these paintings, paintings against a plaster wall and exposed to the air, are still so

nearly perfect. It is a wonder, indeed, that they have not all been entirely effaced for ages past."

MR. LOUGH'S GALLERY.

We take blame to ourselves for not having paid an earlier visit to the exhibition of this artist's works in sculpture. Mr. Lough is the same gentleman who a few years since was labouring in his profession, in one of the narrow streets of the Strand, now banished by the "wast improvements" in the neighbourhood of Exeter Change. This artist's fame has rapidly increased since that period, and what he has now brought forward for the eye of his brother-artists and the man of taste, bears good evidence of his industry. The place he has chosen for his exhibition is a spacious gallery in Great Portland Street. Although we recognised among the various groups several of our old favourites, exhibited some time since at the Egyptian Hall, we were not less pleased on a second view. The latest performances are, "Orpheus," "The Expulsion," and "Satan." The former is a beautiful work, and, as the cata. logue informs us, is to be executed in marble for Sir Matthew White Ridley. The other two subjects are, of course, from Milton's sublime poem, and the republican poet himself might, we think, view them and approve.

Those who have never inspected the works of this talented artist, may now have an opportunity of viewing nearly the whole of them. We cordially wish Mr. Lough the success to which his ge nius entitles him, and recommend a visit to his gallery to every lover of this, the most difficult, and grandest branch of the fine arts.

Table Talk.

MODERN ITALIAN POETRY.-Italy abounds in poets; in poetasters at least. The people here are as much prone to poetry, as the people in Sussex are to pudding. There is a too great facility for versification and rhyme in their language, which, by everlastingly inviting them to string words together with a jingle, has perhaps given the Italians credit for even more imagination than they have. They fall into rhyme upon occasions that make it perfectly absurd. I have met with a captain in the Italian army who has been writing about rural economy. He has a little treatise on what he calls la

panificazione del gran Turco, that is, the way of making bread of Indian corn; which he read to me with much gravity. The captain's flour is hardly well in the tub, when he breaks forth with half a dozen rhymes in praise of the food that is to be made of it; then he kneads the dough in sober prose; but has another stanza before the batch goes into the oven! The productions of the imitators of Petrarch, the sonnetteers, are remarkable for their want of meaning: nothing can be quite so insipid as an Italian sonnet.-No one is long in Rome without perceiving the truth of the old Italian saying-" The Tuscan language in a Roman's mouth."The common people have a disagreeable patois of their own, which they pronounce with an ugly sing-song nasal twang. It is not here as in Tuscany, where the language of all classes is equally pure in grammar and equally insignificant in sound. Here the many speak ill, and the few correctly. But, the language of the few makes amends for that of the many. It is delightful to hear the wellbred Romans talk; they pronounce every syllable so distinctly and with so much fulness of sound. At Rome the "bastard Latin" really bears some resemblance to the genuine language of the ancients. The voices of the Romans are often strong and harsh: this is particularly observable in the women, many of whom speak with a kind of croak that is very disagreeable. Some of them give a roughness to their language that would seem almost impossible for this language to have in any mouth. But, hear a Roman lady who has a voice like that of an English woman talk her own language, and then you hear Italian in perfection. So much does the smoothness, the harmony of a language, depend on the voice in which it is uttered. I have been told that the voices of the German women make their language musical; and I can almost believe this, after knowing how much discord may be imparted to the Italian.

A French Giant.—A family of silkweavers, living in the quarter St. Jacques, of Paris, consisting of a father, mother, and child, all of whom enjoy uninterrupted and vigorous health; the former two, ever since their marriage, have continued to live, upon four pounds of coarse wheaten bread, and one pound of beef daily, these substances being so distributed that one-fourth of each is eaten by the mother, one-fourth by the child, and two-fourths by the father;

in addition to these substances, they take nothing during the day but a little coffee, not remarkably strong, in the morning; and when business is remarkably flourishing, once upon a time, by way of holiday feasting, a few vege tables, such as haricot bean, cabbage, or potato. The husband is from Caen, forty-five years of age, nine feet ten inches (English measure) in height, and very robust and fat; the wife is from Lyons, thirty-four years of age, about five feet (English measure) in height, and very strong and muscular; the child is also strong, and healthy, and nine years of age. The parents have been married eighteen years, the whole of which period they have dwelt in the same part of Paris.

Varieties.

NOLLEKENS, the celebrated sculptor, died immensely rich. "His singular and parsimonious habits," said his biographer, “ were most observable in his domestic life. Coals were articles of great consideration with Mr. Nollekens; and these he so rigidly economised, that they were always sent early, before his men came to work, in order that he might have leisure time for counting the sacks, and disposing of the large coals in what was originally designed by the builder of his house for a winecellar, so that he might lock them up for parlour use. Candles were never lighted at the commencement of the evening; whenever they heard a knock at the door, they would wait until they heard a second rap, lest the first should have been a runaway, and their candles wasted. Mr. and Mrs. Nollekens used a flat candlestick when there was any thing to be done; and I have been assured, that a pair of moulds, by being well nursed, and put out when company went away, once lasted them a "whole year!" Insensible as Nollekens generally was when looking at works of ancient art, in no instance, except when speaking of Flaxman, did he depreciate the production of modern artists; on the contrary, he has frequently said, when he has been solicited to model a bust, "Go to Chantrey-he's the man for a bust; he'll make a good busto for you; I always recommend him." He has been known to give an artist, who could not afford to purchase it, a lump of stone, to enable him to execute an order, though at the same time he has thrown himself into a violent passion with the cat, for biting the feather off an

old pen with which he had for many years oiled the hinges of his gates when they creaked.

ANECDOTE OF THE PLAGUE. A writer in the Foreign Quarterly Review relates the following anecdote of the plague :-"In the village of Careggi, whether it were that due precautions had not been taken, or that the disease was of a peculiarly malignant nature, one after another first the young, and then the old, of a whole family, dropped off. A woman who lived on the opposite side of the way, the wife of a labourer, the mother of two little boys, felt herself attacked by fever in the night; in the morning it greatly increased, and in the evening the fatal tumour appeared. This was during the absence of her husband, who went to work at a distance, and only returned on Saturday night, bringing home the scanty means of subsistence for his family for the week. Terrified by the example of the neighbouring family, moved by the fondest love for her children, and determining not to communicate the disease to them, she formed the heroic resolution of leaving her home, and going elsewhere to die. Having locked them into a room, and sacrificed to their safety even the last and sole comfort of a parting embrace, she ran down the stairs, carrying with her the sheets and coverlet, that she might leave no means of contagion. She then shut the door, with a sigh, and went away. But the biggest, hearing the door shut, went to the window, and, seeing her running in that manner, cried out, "Good bye, mother," in a voice so tender, that she involuntarily stopped. "Good bye, mother," repeated the youngest child, stretching its little head out of the window. And thus was the poor afflicted mother compelled, for a time, to endure the dreadful conflict between the yearnings which called her back, and the pity and solicitude which urged her on. At length the latter conquered; and, amid

a flood of tears, and the farewells of her children, who knew not the fatal cause and import of those tears, she reached the house of those who were to bury her. She recommended her husband and children to them, and in two days she was no more."

SHEPHERDS IN CUMBERLAND.-The cottages in some parts of Cumberland are often widely scattered, and a great number of the people are engaged as have I witnessed in these and other shepherds, herdsmen, &c. Frequently mountainous districts, a delightful illustration of the good Shepherd, wherein it is said, "the sheep know his voice." When the sun is about to set, a shepherd's boy advances along the foot of a chain of mountains, and giving the flocks, which were scattered like a signal by a peculiar call or whistle, spots of snow over those stupendous heights, begin to move simultaneously, and collecting as they pour down the steep descent, approach him in order, without leaving behind one solitary straggler.-Wilderspin's Early Discipline.

FEROCITY OF CATS AT TRISTAN D'ACUNA.-When the first settlers arrived here, they brought with them several cats; some of which unfortunately escaped into the bushes, and have increased so rapidly, that they have become quite a nuisance. Poultry had run wild, and the climate was so congenial that they multiplied prodigiously, and were to be found in all parts of the island in abundance; but since the cats have been introduced the poor fowls disappear rapidly. Indeed these wild cats come so near the settlement as to attack and carry off the domestic poultry. I was out a few mornings ago, when the dogs caught one upon the beach. The nature and appearance of the animal seem quite changed; all the characteristics of the domestic cat were gone; it was fierce, bold, and strong; and stood battle some time against four good dogs, before it was killed.

Wednesday, 1st August.

Lammas day; i. e. Lamb Mass, or, according to some" Loaf Mass," it being a day of oblations. The term " Latter Laminas," is used to signify a time that never comes.

Monday, 6th August.

Transfiguration; in memory of the trausfiguration of our Lord's appearance on Mount Tabor.

Tuesday, 7th August.

Name of Jesus. Dedicated to this by our reformers, instead of Afra, or Donatus, of the Ronan calendar.

Ellustrated Article.

THE ACE OF CLUBS. BY THE O'HARA FAMILY.

AT English fairs, business and merriment are kept rather distinct. The buying and selling of sheep, oxen, and horses, commonly occur before the gingerbread-booths, the toy-booths, and the dancing-booths-(such as the dancing in the latter is found to be)-are visited, and take place upon some spot detached from the crowded encampments of pleasure and finery. At Irish fairs, however, important sales, halfpenny adventures in gambling, lovemaking, dancing-(" the right sort of a fair") and perhaps some harinless fighting, used, in our time, to go hand in hand from the opening of the blessed day. Hence, our Irish fair was a less orderly but more rousing scene than one in this inveterately decorous island. While the mind of a serious spectator is filled with the important circumstance of groups of "strong farmers" bargaining about the transfer of fifty or a hundred great horned beasts, his VOL. IX.

See page 486.

livelier or lighter sensibilities might be appealed to by the oratory of the proprietress of a show of fragile nick-nacks, alarmed lest some of those animals should overthrow and shatter at a touch her whole stock in trade: or a richcheeked country girl, laughing loudly, and struggling "just for dacency," half caused by her half- proffered lips, the uncouth smack which startles our observer, and which is the payment for her swain's "treat" to a grass-green ribbon, or a pair of scarlet garters; or the rub-a-dub of a set of "jiggers," with their cries of ecstacy, strikes upon his ear from some adjacent public-house; or perhaps two "factions." who have been at war-as they would themselves say "ever since their grandfather's time," emit fiercer shouts, as, huddled amongst cattle of all descriptions, and striking the animals as often as their own heads, they fight their twentieth pitched battle for some cause of dispute which neither can explain.

About forty years ago, when the reader had most to do with such an assemblage, an accompanying feature, now almost worn out by the progress of gen

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tility, was observable. While elderly farmers plodded to the important rendezvous strictly in the spirit of men of business, their sons, or perhaps some youthful landholders of four or five hundred acres, pushed in from the country on nearly whole-blood horses, arrayed in the Sunday suit, which, at each weekly mass, made them the stars of their district chapels, purely or chiefly to ride up and down through the throngs of men, women, and beasts, vouching their attractions in the face of half the assembled county, and also in the faces of rural "darkers," of the other sex, who, perched on pillions behind their fathers, and flaming in all colours, came pretty nearly in the same policy, to the great general mart for the day.

A group of such gallant amateurs, standing still because they have been blocked up by surrounding droves of cattle, is presented to the reader, at the fair, holden about forty years ago, to which we direct our attention. The young men were all known to each other; and they talked or laughed cheerily, and seemed fully enjoying their day's adventures.

"But stop, boys," said one, "here comes Martin Brophy, and if he sees us so merry he'll swear we're laughing at himself."

"And then put a quarrel on us all," said another.

"Then ye won't spake to him, boys?" asked a third.

"What is the use, Jack? Ever since things went so conthrary against him, you can't look but he thinks it a slight, so that there's no managing with Martin; and I, for one, will just let him go quietly by on his poor broken-doon half-blood."

"Besides, Tom, though an auld head can't be put on young shoulders, (a truth we all stand up for,) Martin done the vengeance entirely, in regard of his behaviour to little Calty Morissy." 66 Yes, and the priest caeling himt for it, at last mass, Sunday-se'nnit (week,)" added a pious person of the party; "but here he is! See, boys!" speaking loudly, and pointing his whip to a drove of cows and oxen, while the eyes of his companions followed his"them browns is the clanest cattle in the fair, to my mind."

Martin Brophy passed them with eyes studiously averted in the opposite direction, as if he had determined to an

ticipate their slight; and yet his erect carriage, his knitted brow, and his protruded lips, destroyed the ease which should have given to the act its best expression, and suggested, instead, a bitter and haughty consciousness of the presence of his former companions in the carouse, and in the sporting-field.

They continued their observations by turns.

"There he goes-the proudest and the poorest grandee in Leinster."

"Look at the hat!-the poor hair will be growing through it with the next crop.'

"But the auld green!"-(Martin's coat)-“it aught to bring him new ones by that time, for it's long ago it ran to seed between his shoulders."

"And what brings him to the fair, boys?"

"To sell auld Nora:" (Martin's skeleton steed.)

"Yes-to the tanners."

"Or to cut a dash on her backbone."

"Ay-before Dora Marum; only she's not here; I stopt at the house, today morning, to know if she'd be at the fair with auld cranky Dan, the father of her; but, no, purty Dora couldn't come."

"Then Martin won't take the light ont of her eyes, entirely, this blessed day."

66 Hoot, tut, man-a-live; in jest or arnest, that's all gone by; Dan gave him the cauld shawldher, long ago."

They separated to resume the exhibition of their handsome steeds and admirable persons through the fair. We follow the individual of whom they have been speaking.

He was a man as young as any of them; better featured than any, notwithstanding that premature sufferings and the conflict of strong passions had thinned and swarthed his cheek; nay, his air, and the character of those features gave him nearer claims than any to a gentleman-like appearance, although, as they had truly remarked, his attire was shabby.

He had not overheard a word of the jeers spoken at his expense, but his sensitive mind imagined such a dialogue between his former friends, and ima gined it to an extent even beyond the reality; and the petty ferment consequently called up in his bosom, worked his features and temper more violently than greater misfortunes had that day done.

They scoffingly wondered why he ap