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that I would willingly have refrained altogether from foreing upon his attention this hateful subject especially amid such scenes and objects as we have just been contemplating: but I was afraid that my silence might have seemed to give consent to it.deniyia mang 3200

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We must now transport ourselves to the environs of London, and see what this happy season is producing there for to leave the very heart of the country, and cast ourselves at once into the very heart of the town, would be likely to put us into a temper not suited to the time. Now, on Palm Sunday, boys and girls (youths and maidens have now-a-days got above so childish a practice,) may be met early in the morning, in blithe, but breakfastless companies, sallying forth towards the pretty outlets about Hampstead and Highgate, on the one side the water, and Camberwell and Clapham on the other all of which they innocently imagine to be "the country"-there to sport away the pleasant hours till dinner-time, and then return home with joy in their hearts, endless appetites in their stomachs, and bunches of the sallow willow with its silken bloom-buds in their hands, as trophies of their travels.

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Now, at last, the Easter week is arrived, and the poor have for once in the year the best of it-setting all things, but their own sovereign will, at a wise defiance. The journeyman who works on Easter Monday, even though he were a tailor itself, should lose his caste, and be sent to the Coventry of mechanics-wherever that may be. In fact, it cannot happen. On Easter Monday ranks change places Jobson is as good as Sir John-the "rude mechanical" is "monarch of all he surveys" from the summit of Greenwich-hill--and when he thinks fit to say "It is our royal pleasure to be drunk!" who shall dispute the proposition? Not I, for one. When our English mechanics accuse their betters of oppressing them, the said betters should r reverse the old appeal, and refer from Philip sober to Philip drunk; and then nothing more could be said. But Now, they have no betters, even in their own notion of the matter. And, in the name of all that is transitory, envy them not their brief supremacy! It will be over before the end of the week, and they will be as eager to return to their labour as they now are to escape from it: for the only thing that an Englishman, whether high or low, cannot endure patiently for a week together, is, unmingled amusement. At this time, however, he is determined to try. Accordingly, on Easter Monday all the narrow lanes and blind alleys of our metropolis pour forth their dingy denizens into the suburban fields and villages, in search of the said amusement--which is plentifully provided for them by another class, even less enviable than the one on whose patronage they depend:-for of all callings, the most melancholy is that of purveyor of pleasure to the poor. During the Monday our determined holiday-maker, as in duty bound, contrives, by the aid of a little or not a little artificial stimulus, to be happy in a tolerably exemplary manner. On the Tuesday, he fancies himself happy today, because he felt himself so yesterday. On the Wednesday he cannot tell what has come to him-but every ten minutes he wishes himself at home where he never goes but to sleep. On Thursday he finds out the secret that he is heartily sick of doing nothing, but is ashamed to confess it: and then what is the use of going to work before his money is spent? On Friday he swears that he is a fool for

throwing away the greater part of his quarter's savings without having any thing to show for it-and gets gloriously drunk with the rest, to prove his words: passing the pleasantest night of all the week in a watch-house. And on Saturday, after thanking "his worship" for his good advice, of which he does not remember, a word, he comes to the wise determination that, after all, there is nothing like working all day long in silence, and at night spending his earnings and his breath in beer and politics! So much for the Easter week of a London holiday

maker.

But there is a sport belonging to Easter Monday, which is not confined to the lower classes, and which, fun forbid that I should pass over silently. If the reader has not, during his boyhood, performed the exploit of riding to the turn-out of the stag on Epping Forest;-following the hounds all day long,--at a respectful distance;-returning home in the evening with the loss of nothing but his hat, his hunting whip, and his horse-not to mention a portion of his nether person;-and finishing the day by joining the Lady Mayoress's ball at the Mansion-house ;if the reader has not done all this when a boy, I will not tantalize him by expatiating on the superiority of those who have. And if he has done it, I need not tell him that he has no cause to envy his friend who escaped with a flesh-wound from the fight of Waterloo-for there is not a pin to choose between them!

I have little to tell the reader in regard to London exclusively, this month which is lucky, because I have left myself less than no space at all to tell it in. I must mention, however, that now is heard in her streets, the prettiest of all the cries which are peculiar to them "Come buy my primroses!"--and but for which, the Londoners would have no idea that Spring was at hand. Now, spoiled children make "fools" of their mamas and papas;-which is but fair, seeing that the said mamas and papas return the compliment during all the rest of the year.--Now, not even a sceptical apprentice but is religiously persuaded of the merits of Good-Friday, and the propriety of its being so called--since it procures him two Sundays in the week instead of one. Finally,--Now, exhibitions of paintings court the public attention, and obtain it, in every quarter;-on the principle, I suppose, that the eye has, at this season of the year, a natural hungering and thirsting after the colours of the Spring leaves and flowers, and rather than not meet with them at all, it is content to find them on painted canvass !

THE RITTER BANN. A BALLAD.

BY T. CAMPBELL.

THE Ritter Bann from Hungary
Came back, renown'd in arms,
But scorning jousts of chivalry
And love and ladies' charms.

While other knights held revels, he
Was wrapt in thoughts of gloom,

And in Vienna's hostelrie

Slow paced his lonely room.

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But seeing with him an ancient dame
Come clad in Scotch attire,
The Ritter's colour went and came,
And loud he spoke in ireoi

"Ha! nurse of her that was my bane,
Name not her name to me;

I wish it blotted from my brain:
Art poor-take alms, and flee."

"Sir Knight," the abbot interposed,

"This case your ear demands;"

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And the crone cried, with a cross enclosed
In both her trembling hands.

"Remember, each his sentence waits;
And he that shall rebut.

Sweet Mercy's suit, on him the gates
Of Mercy shall be shut.

You wedded undispensed by Church,
Your cousin Jane in Spring ;-
In Autumn, when you went to search
For churchmen's pardoning,

Her house denounced your marriage-band,
Betrothed her to De Grey,

And the ring you put upon her hand
Was wrench'd by force away.

Then wept your Jane upon my neck,
Crying, Help me, nurse, to flee

To my Howel Bann's Glamorgan hills;'
But word arrived-ah me!

You were not there; and 'twas their threat,
By foul means or by fair,

To-morrow morning was to set
The seal on her despair.

I had a son, a sea-boy in
A ship at Hartland bay,
By his aid from her cruel kin
1 bore my bird away.
To Scotland from the Devon's
Green myrtle shores we fled;
And the Hand that sent the ravens
To Elijah, gave us bread.

She wrote you by my son, but he'
From England sent us word
You had gone into some far countrie,
In grief and gloom he heard.
For they that wrong'd you, to elude
Your wrath, defamed my child;
And you-ay, blush Sir, as you should-
Believed, and were beguiled.

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To die but at your feet, she vow'd'
To roam the world; and we

Would both have sped and begg'd our bread,
But so it might not be.

For when the snow-storm beat our roof,
She bore a boy, Sir Bann,

Who grew as fair your likeness proof
As child e'er grew like man.

'Twas smiling on that babe one morn
While heath bloom'd on the moor,
Her beauty struck young Lord Kinghorn
As he hunted past our door.

She shunn'd him, but he raved of Jane,
And roused his mother's pride;
Who came to us in high disdain,-
And where's the face,' she cried,
Has witch'd my boy to wish for one
So wretched for his wife?—
Dost love thy husband? Know, my son
Has sworn to seek his life.'

Her anger sore dismay'd us,

For our mite was wearing scant,
And, unless that dame would aid us,
There was none to aid our want.

So I told her, weeping bitterly,
What all our woes had been;
And, though she was a stern ladie,
The tears stood in her een.

And she housed us both, when, cheerfully,

My child to her had sworn,

That even if made a widow, she

Would never wed Kinghorn.”

Here paused the nurse, and then began
The abbot, standing by:

"Three months ago a wounded man
To our abbey came to die.

He heard me long, with ghastly eyes
And hand obdurate clench❜d,
Speak of the worm that never dies,
And the fire that is not quench'd.

At last by what this scroll attests
He left atonement brief,

For years of anguish to the breasts
His guilt had wrung with grief.

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The treachery took she waited wild;
My slave came back and lied
Whate'er I wish'd; she clasp'd her child,
And swoon'd, and all but died.

I felt her tears for years and years
Quench not my flame, but stir;
The very hate I bore her mate
Increased my love for her.

Fame told us of his glory, while
Joy flush'd the face of Jane;

Aud whilst she bless'd his name, her smile
Struck fire into my brain,

No fears could damp; I reach'd the camp,
Sought out its champion;

And if my broad-sword fail'd at last,

'Twas long and well laid on.

This wound's my meed, my name's Kinghorn,

My foe's the Ritter Bann.'

The wafer to his lips was borne,

And we shrived the dying man.

He died not till you went to fight

The Turks at Warradein;

But I see my tale has changed you pale."-
The abbot went for wine;

And brought a little page who pour'd

It out, and knelt and smiled :—

The stunn'd knight saw himself restored

To childhood in his child.

And stoop'd and caught him to his breast,

Laugh'd loud and wept anon,

And with a shower of kisses press'd

The darling little one.

"And where went Jane ?"" To a nunnery, Sir

Look not again so pale

Kinghorn's old dame grew harsh to her."—

"And has she ta'en the veil ?"

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"Sit down, Sir," said the priest, "I bar Rash words."-They sat all three,

And the boy play'd with the knight's broad star,

As he kept him on his knee.

"Think ere you ask her dwelling-place,"

The abbot further said;

"Time draws a veil o'er beauty's face

More deep than cloister's shade.

Grief may have made her what you can
Scarce love perhaps for life."-
"Hush, abbot," cried the Ritter Bann,
"Or tell me where's my wife.",

The priest undid two doors that hid
The inn's adjacent room,
And there a lovely woman stood,

Tears bathed her beauty's bloom. !
One moment may with bliss repay.
Unnumber'd hours of pain;
Such was the throb and mutual sob
Of the Knight embracing Jane.

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