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fortnight at Wick, making a run to John o' Groat's, or
a visit to Shetland, to diversify the scene a little. We
offer this as a prescription that will kill one year's
ennui as dead as a cured herring.

*

autograph. Having supplied himself with a tracing of the poet's signature, he wrote a mortgage-deed, imitating the law-hand of the time of James I., and affixed thereto Shakspeare's sign-manual. deed, purporting to be between Shakspeare and one This mortgageMichael Fraser and Elizabeth his wife, not only transfelicity, but attracted crowds of other connoisseurs and ported the sage elder into the seventh heaven of antiquaries. To the question where the deed was found, Ireland the younger replied, that he had formed an acquaintance with a gentleman of ancient family, possessed of a mass of deeds and papers relating to his ancestors, who, finding him very partial to the examination of old documents, had permitted him to inspect them; that, shortly after commencing his search, the mortgage-deed in question had fallen into his hands, and had been presented to him by the proprietor.' He added, 'that the personage alluded to, well aware that sensation, and being a very retiring and diffident man, the name of Shakspeare must create a considerable had bound him by a solemn engagement never to divulge his name.' this young rogue's skill and plausibility produced the effect he wished-Mr Byng, afterwards Viscount Whereupon-so completely had Torrington, Sir Frederick Eden, and many others, gave it as their decided opinion that, wheresoever he found the deed, there, no doubt, the mass of papers existed which had been so long and vainly sought after by the numerous commentators on Shakspeare!

modestly called them, the young scapegrace proThus urged to make further searches,' as he ceeded to pen a few letters and The Profession of Faith of William Shakspear,'* the whole of which passed muster, although, in many instances, the documents produced as two hundred years old had not been fabricated many hours previous to their production. On the pretended Profession of Faith,' particularly, Dr Warton, after having twice perused the important document, pronounced a pompous eulogy in the presence of Dr Parr: 'Sir, we have many fine things in our church-service, and our liturgy abounds in beauties; but here, sir, is a man who has distanced us all!'

ANATOMY OF A LITERARY FORGERY. ALTHOUGH, doubtless, all the world, or at least all the reading part of it, has heard of that most audacious of literary forgeries, Vortigern, a Tragedy, yet, as we suspect that very few even of the few who have seen it have ever read it, and that only a small minority of our readers generally is at all likely to be acquainted with its history, we purpose to avail ourselves of the recent acquisition of a copy of the rare reprint of 1832, to supply-in many places in the forger's own words-such an account of the circumstances which led to the perpetration of the fraud as shall be wanting, we fully hope, neither in interest nor instruction. Samuel Ireland, the father of the unhappy lad whose career we are about to trace, was emphatically one of those madmen who make men mad-one of those idolaters who esteem the book above the life, and who, without an eye to see or a heart to understand wherein lies the greatness of him whom they adore, prefer some filthy, worm-eaten, useless relic of their deified mortal to the body of genius and wisdom, which is in the better testament of his works. Even such a divinity, according to the testimony of the son, was Shakspeare to Samuel Ireland. least out of the seven' were his writings made the 'Four days at after-dinner theme of the old man's conversation; while in the evening, still further to impress the subject upon the minds of his son and his visitors, certain plays were selected, and a part allotted to each, in order that they might read aloud and-commune, doubtless, with the soul of their divinity, and extract the heart of the mystery? no-but in order that they might thereby acquire a knowledge of the delivery of blank verse articulately and with proper emphasis!' 'The comments to which these rehearsals, if I may be permitted so to call them, gave rise, were of a nature to elicit, in all its bearings, the enthusiasm entertained by my father for the bard of Avon. With him, Shakspeare was no mortal, but a divinity; and frequently, while expatiating on this subject, impregnated with all the fervour of Garrick, with whom he had been on intimate terms, my father would declare that to possess a single vestige of the poet's handwriting, would be esteemed a gem beyond all price, and far dearer to him than his whole collection. At these conversations, young Ireland was always present, swallowing with avidity the honeyed poison; when, by way,' he says, ' of completing this infatuation, my father, who had already produced picturesque tours of some of the British rivers, determined on commencing that of the Avon, and I was selected as the companion of his quarter of a century before, been played off by Steevens upon journey. Of course,' he adds, 'no inquiries were spared, Malone. Thomas Hart, a descendant of Shakspeare's sister, Joan, *It is curious enough that a somewhat similar fraud had, a either at Stratford or in the neighbourhood, respect-employed, in the year 1770, a bricklayer of the name of Mosely ing the mighty poet. Every legendary tale, vended bequeathed by the poet to his sister for the term of her natural anecdote, or traditionary account, was treasured up. life, at the yearly rent of twelve pence;' and here, between the to new-tile his house-the same house in Henley Street, Stratford, In short, the name of Shakspeare ushered in the dawn, rafters and the tiling, he discovered, or is said to have discovered. and a bumper, quaffed to his immortal memory at night, sealed our weary eyelids to repose.' a manuscript of six leaves, purporting to be 'The Confession of Faith of John Shakspear (the poet's father), an unworthy member of the holy Catholic religion.' Mosely gave his prize to Mr Peyton, Mr Davenport, as a curiosity of great importance. Malone was an alderman of Stratford, who sent it to Malone, through the Rev. completely deceived. 'I have taken some pains,' he says, in 1790, satisfied that it is genuine.' But the paper, as we have said, was a fabrication, and a clumsy one-a trick of Steevens to mislead his 'to ascertain the authenticity of this document, and am perfectly rival editor. Malone, however, discovered his error at last. 'I have of our poet's family. Boswell quietly and judiciously dropped since obtained documents,' he says in a subsequent publication, 'that clearly prove it could not have been the composition of any frauds. the document from his edition, treating it as a paper that had never existed. Malone himself was not guiltless of like unseemly The drawing of Shakspeare's house of New Place, which figures in his edition of 1790 as taken from the margin of an ancient survey,' is, by his own confession, a forgery.

Induced by the reiterated eulogies rung in his ears respecting Shakspeare, by his father's enthusiasm, and, above all, by the incessant remark on the old man's part, that to possess even a signature of the bard would make him the happiest of human beings,' it occurred to young Ireland to take advantage of his residence in a conveyancer's office, environed by old deeds, to produce a spurious imitation of Shakspeare's

*The Shakspeare Forgeries. Vortigern, a Tragedy. Reprinted from the edition of 1796, with an Introduction. By W. H. Ireland. London. 1832.

old ass-heads to more ambitious efforts! Anon, he announced the existence of a drama-the Vortigern Well might the precocious lad be excited by these believed, he had never essayed a pen at poetical we have already referred to-although, if he is to be composition, and had not at the time written a single line of the play which he purposed producing. Prior to its completion, the fame of his discoveries had resounded from one extremity of the country to the other; and on the completion of the drama, strenuous applications were made by the lessee of

Covent Garden Theatre to secure it; but the elder Ireland, from his long intimacy with the Sheridan and Linley families, preferred Drury Lane, where the play was subsequently represented.

Malone, whose experience of deception had given him some caution, now stood forward as 'generalissimo of the unbelievers.' 'Some pamphlets pro and con. had also issued from the press, while the newspapers incessantly teemed with paragraphs written on the spur of the moment, and dictated by the particular sentiments entertained as to the papers by their authors. Malone having, in the interim, collected his mass of documents intended to prove the whole a forgery, committed them to the press, under a hope that he should be able to publish his volume before the representation of Vortigern. The bulkiness of his production, however, having defeated that object, he, the day the piece was to be performed, issued a notice, to the effect that he had a work on the eve of publication which would infallibly prove the manuscripts in Mr Ireland's possession mere fabrications, and warning the people not to be imposed upon by the play advertised for that night's representation, as being from the pen of Shakspeare. My father'-it is young Ireland who writes-'having procured a copy of this notice, though late in the day, instantly forwarded to the press the following handbill, and distributed an immense number amongst the assembled multitudes, then choking up every avenue to Drury Lane Theatre: "VORTIGERN.-A malevolent and impotent attack on the Shakspeare MSS. having appeared on the eve of representation of the play of Vortigern, evidently intended to injure the interests of the proprietor of the MSS., Mr Ireland feels it impossible, within the short space of time that intervenes between the publishing and the representation, to produce an answer to the most illiberal and unfounded assertions in Mr Malone's Inquiry: he is therefore induced to request that the play of Vortigern may be heard with that candour that has ever distinguished a British audience."

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which words were uttered with such a nasal and tinkettle twang, that no muscles save those of adamant [sic] could have resisted the powerful incentive to laughter.'

So far the Irelands and their adherents were scotched, but not slain. Malone's Investigation was at length published, and was answered by George Chalmers, first in his Apology for the Believers, and next in his Supplemental Apology, wherein he refuted, to young Ireland's satisfaction, every position laid down by Malone. After the avowal of the forgery, the author of Vortigern forwarded two very humble letters to Mr Chalmers, who, maintaining a prudent silence, never answered them.

This avowal was made from a stroke of conscience. The forgery had been charged upon the elder Ireland instead of the younger. It was argued that the latter's youth-he was but nineteen-precluding all possibility of the papers being his, the whole must have been fabricated by his father, who had made the son the vehicle of introducing them to the public. It seems, however, that the former was a total stranger to every proceeding in the composition of the papers; and George Steevens, who had been also suspected of participation in the fraud, is stated by Ireland to have been equally innocent. Urged by the imperious motive of rescuing his father's character from unmerited obloquy, he came forward with the truth, having first abandoned the paternal roof, and relinquished a profession for which he was studying. With the wide world before me,' he says, and a host of the most implacable enemies at my back, ere my twentieth year, I entered upon the eventful pilgrimage of life, without a guide to direct my steps, or any means of existence save those which might result from my own industry and perseverance.' Of his after-career we know nothing.

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THERE has been an occasional gleam of sunshine in the lurid horror of the terrible revolt of the sepoys. Many instances have occurred of fidelity and humanity amongst a people whose prejudices and devotional feelings are all against their alien rulers. These have

men who have been brought into close home contact with the English. It may not be uninteresting to our readers, just at this moment, to hear something of the habits and offices of this race, to gaze upon a rude sketch of our Indian servants; and we can best draw it by recalling our first impressions and observations con

John Philip Kemble, who was then stage-manager at Drury Lane, and had had the hero's part in the tragedy assigned to him, saw at a glance that such rubbish as composes Vortigern could never have emanated from the mind of Shakspeare, even in his baby-chiefly been found amongst domestic servants-the hood, and passed that sentence upon it which he felt the public ought, and did afterwards most effectually pronounce. He therefore did his best to procure its representation on the first, instead of the second, of April 1796, in order to pass upon the audience the compliment of fools all.' Foiled in this by the interposition of old Ireland and Mr Sheridan, Kemble, how-cerning them. Two days after our landing, a feverish ever, so managed that the farce of My Grandmother should follow the tragedy, intending that all the bearings of that production should be applied by the audience to the subject of the Shakspearian papers.' He is also charged by the younger Ireland with having preconcerted a signal when the opponents of the papers were to manifest their disapprobation. For this purpose, the following line in the fifth act was selected:

And when this solemn mockery is o'er. However this may be, no sooner had he arrived at this line, which he delivered in an exceedingly pointed manner, than 'a deafening clamour reigned throughout one of the most crowded houses ever recollected in theatrical history, which lasted several minutes. Upon a hearing being at length obtained, instead of taking up the following line of the speech in rotation, Mr Kemble reiterated the above line with an expression the most pointedly sarcastic and acrimonious it is possible to conceive. Added to this, the late Mr Dignum was purposely placed by Mr Kemble in a subordinate part, wherein, speaking of the sounding of trumpets, he had to exclaim: "Let them bellow on!"

attack confined me to my chamber and the adjoining
sitting-room. As yet, I had only seen the servants en
masse, as it were, without absolutely distinguishing one
from the other. Now, as it was not clear whether my
illness was infectious or not, I was left to the care of
the native ayah and a European maid.
After sunset,
thinking they would both be glad of a little cool air,
I told them they might leave me, and go on the
house-top or into the garden for a change. They
accepted the offer gladly, and I soon after fell asleep
on the sofa of the sitting-room. I awoke with eager
thirst; and as I slowly opened my eyes, beheld what
appeared to me, at first, a strange vision. On a mat
on the ground, at the foot of the sofa, sat the tall
figure of a very handsome native, his arms crossed
on his bosom, and his large black eyes fixed earnestly
on my face. He was dressed in a peon's attire-that
is, a sort of short white blouse girt round the waist
by a sash; a turban on his head, and a sword beside
him. That he was devout, a short strip of paint
between his eyebrows testified. I felt at first a little
uneasy at finding myself the object of that fixed stare;
but it was only significant of the watchfulness of a

careful attendant. The moment I stirred, the dark eyes fell, and the lithe form rose with noiseless grace. He went outside the crimson silk screen which stood at the door, and returned with a glass of toast and water, which he held kindly, but very respectfully, to my lips. When I had finished drinking, he replaced the tumbler, and again seated himself, this time with drooping eyes and folded arms, for I was awake, and could speak if I needed anything. Still not a movement escaped him. I was restless, and he smoothed and arranged my pillows; I dropped my handkerchief -it was restored instantly; I looked flushed, and he brought a punkah of painted feathers, and fanned me. A kinder nurse than this poor peon I never saw.

He was, I found, the sepoy who waited in the young ladies' apartments; and at night, with his drawn sword beside him, slept at our open chamber-doors, ever ready, if called on, to destroy an insect or bring a cup of tea. A civil, quiet, amiable man was Juan the sepoy-a Mohammedan, we believe, though, as we were not allowed to talk on religious subjects with the servants of the palace, we could not be sure.

His service was a gentle one. He was always except at his hours for eating, &c.-to be found seated near the sitting-room door, ready to go errands, pull the punkah or fan which hangs across the room, pick up a handkerchief, wipe our pens, and render every sort of miscellaneous service which English languor or luxury might exact. And his 'spiriting' was done in a style worthy of Ariel, so graceful was it, and noiseless, and calm.

There were two hundred servants altogether in and about Parell. The head domestics were Parsees. The major-domo, a fat, portly personage, ruled all the others. He was a good-looking man, with a very intelligent countenance, handsome, though disfigured by the high purple cotton Guebre cap. All the men who waited at table, or brought food, when at any time required, were Parsees. I found, when we travelled, that I had to commit the custody of my rupees, in their heavy bag, to Cursetjee, the under butler, or majordomo's assistant, who doled my money out to me when required, and was treasurer in like manner to the whole family. These servants were very superior to all the other domestics. Handsome, active, intelligent, and kindly, they shew superiority of race in a very extraordinary degree. One of them was called the 'Count d'Orsay' of the establishment, on account of his studied elegance of manner, which was at times very entertaining. He went to the governor one day, and with profound humility requested 'a letter of introduction' to the staff-surgeon, the talented and excellent Dr M'Lennan. The governor, amused at the request, asked why he wished to have it. To ask for some pills,' was the reply. N.B.-The pills were of course supplied to all of the household who asked for them. Another time, when we were travelling, and I had unwittingly rested my feet on a covered basket at the bottom of the carriage, an act which caused him, as provedditore, some uneasiness, he came up to the door, bowed profoundly, and observed that it was not good for missee's health to sit with her feet in the butter!' Our own especial Parsee, however, the ladies' favourite,' was superior to all the others. His name was Arjesia; he was active in fulfilling the slightest request; honest, kind, and intelligent, and took apparently a greater interest in us than the other servants did. He liked to explain customs, to teach us Hindostanee words, to inform us about his own faith. Once, on occasion of a total eclipse which took place during our stay in India, we asked him why the people of the adjoining village were tamtaming and making such a noise. He replied: 'Ignorant people think that great serpent come to eat up sun, so they beat tam-tam to frighten him away.'

6

And what do you think the darkness is, Arjesia ?'

'Parsee know, Ma'am Sahib. Sun angry 'cos men wicked; he hide him face.

Oh!'

Once a European maid-servant asked him why he sighed so deeply, as he came out of the lady's room. 'Ah, because me like Ma'am Sahib, and she so wicked; I know God be angry with her.' 'Why, what has she done wicked?' 'She blow out candle, like nothin''t all. This lamentation of poor Arjesia reminds me that it is-at least on the Bombay side of India-the peculiar office of a separate servant to light and extinguish the candles and lamps. This man is called a massall; and it was his office I thoughtlessly usurped when I blew out the taper, and shocked my kind Parsee friend. It is this man, the massall, who steals noiselessly through the chambers at nightfall, and lights the wicks floating in a tumbler of cocoa-nut oil, which stand on the floor of every bedroom. If a light is required at any other hour in the twenty-four, it is the massall who is sought to light it. I once nearly lost an English mail by requiring a taper to seal my letter. The massall had to be found before light could be obtained at all; and when the taper was lighted, it was stopped by every Parsee it met on its road to me, that the first kindled fire might be duly reverenced. Parsees, peons, massalls. Who come next? Oh, the ayah! In order of precedence, she should have been first. We can see that important personage even now, in our mind's eye-a small woman, rather old too, gaily dressed in a yellow satin jacket, and a voluminous veil falling all round her, of white muslin edged with gold. Her office was to attend her young ladies after the bath, braid hair, which she did to perfection, and otherwise attire them; but she could not work as an English lady's-maid does, and therefore an essential member of the feminine staff was a dirgee or tailor.

Our dirgee, hired at fifteen rupees (L.1, 10s.) per month, was a Portuguese half-caste, rejoicing in the name of Giuseppe Maria Emanuele da Silva. Seated on a sheet in one corner of our bedroom, he waited quietly for anything to mend or make, and did his work beautifully. His genius was, however, rather imitative than creative. He always made dresses by a European pattern, save in one instance, when, to please him, we allowed him to make up an India muslin just as he chose. It was, when finished, of a pretty fancy, though very singular, being trimmed all over with small fans of muslin, fastened with bows of ribbon. He worked beautifully, his stitches being nearly invisible. When he left me for another place, he brought a certificate for my signature; this paper, evidently written by some professional scribe or letter-writer, stated that the said Giuseppe Maria Emanuele da Silva was honourable, discreet, honest, clever-an unequalled dirgee,' and, in fact, possessed of every virtue under heaven. I demurred a little at having to make, or rather sign, such assertions; but I was told the certificate would only be taken at its real value, as it was a mere form; so I added thereto my name.

'Ayah' proved to be the least trustworthy of our Indian servants. Having taken offence at one of her 'young ladies,' she changed a bottle of red lavender for one of laudanum; and but for a mistake of the hakim or native doctor, who dispensed medicines in the house, the dose thus taken might have been fatal, and a very charming young lady have been lost to English society; but the laudanum had by accident been mixed with tincture of rhubarb.

Our 'housemaids' were men-hamals, as they are called (an Arabic name) in Bombay. Their office was to make beds, clean the rooms, &c. It was strange to see them at their feminine tasks, some few of which only appeared worthy of their strength; and when their work of this kind was finished, stranger still to

behold them seated on the ground making, perhaps, a satin jacket for their wives! They filled the baths. A low-caste woman, born to her office, which is hereditary, emptied all slops from the basin and bath. In fact, the division of labour was absolutely intricate. Our washerman or dobee was also a constant servant. No change of laundresses in India! Your dobee goes where you go, taking his train of employés with him, and washing your scarcely tumbled garments in the tank, with such energy, that their beatings on the stones cause the dirgee's services to be very frequently in request.

Then come the mollies-an appellation which would better suit the masculine housemaids than the caste to which it belongs-that is, the gardeners. Lowcaste they are, and very poor, as may be seen by their slight figures and scanty garments, for your native,' as he rises in the scale of rupees, waxes ponderous as well as prosperous, and wears clothing in accordance with his estate. We saw but little of our poor molly; only once a day, in fact, when we left our bedrooms, and found him waiting outside with the pretty morningoffering of a bouquet of large roses, full blown, tied round a stick in the form of a large plate, and well sprinkled with rose-water.

They rank as outdoor servants with gorawallahs (grooms), &c., and perhaps should scarcely be included amongst household servants; but that graceful little morning visit has given them, in our mind, a place within the threshold.

All other domestics are almost constantly within sight and hearing; for as there are no bells to summon them, their attendance is nearer and more personal than that of European attendants. One or two are constantly in the apartment, or just outside it, like the 'confidants' of an old French comedy; and must thus become more intimate with the feelings, habits, and interests of the family than our English servants do. It is amongst this class that much faith, kindness, and gratitude have been displayed in the late dreadful revolt; as indeed might naturally have been expected. But for their habitual timidity, they would probably have done much more. We remember the only instance in which the question of whose place it was to do a thing, occurred in an establishment where every man was born to his work, and did it. This was an embarras proceeding wholly from want of courage. I was reading in the young ladies' parlour in our Deccan bungalow, when a voice from the next room called me. I obeyed the summons, which came from a bravehearted lady who was on a sofa, and unable to move from indisposition.

'I think,' she said softly, there is a tiger in my bedroom; I have seen a shadow like one through the open door. Will you shut it, and call the chobdhar?' her silver-stick.'

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Eh, me! missee-no, not my place; I call sepoy.' Sepoy made the same objection; Parsee ditto: at length a large party, armed with guns, assembled, and in great force entered the sitting-room. Then came the tug of war: it was nobody's place to open the door, and I was finally compelled to do the deed with my own hand, which, after all, required no great valour, as it opened towards me, and was in itself a cover. No rush of a tiger followed. There was a pause, and then slowly, with guns levelled, they advanced and discovered-not a tiger, but a large cat, whose magnified shadow had thus betrayed to English eyes their want of pluck.

Our servants slept on mats outside our rooms, in case of nightly service being required, well wrapped from mosquitoes in veils of different degrees of smartness. We used to walk through a gallery of sleeping

attendants on our way to our own rooms every night, and slept ourselves with open doors, confident in their protection and good faith. We trust this confidence will still continue, and that when we think of the Bengal sepoy's cruelty and treachery, we may at the same moment recollect how kind, how gentle, and, in most instances, how faithful have been our Indian servants.

OUR CURATES.

We have had a great number of these in our parish, and from my position as churchwarden, I am tolerably well fitted to speak upon the subject. Under 'Preferments and Appointments,' in the church newspapers, you may have seen, about once in every six months or so, the Rev. Somebody Something to the curacy of Little Biddlebrigham, Devon,' and have been under the mistaken impression that the young man had got a good thing; but this is far from being the case. 'A title given' and 'a sole charge' are the baits with which we allure juvenile divines into our parish, and we have found them very killing-the baits, I mean, not the divines; but since we are upon that subject, I may state at once that the word might have been not seldom applied to our curates themselves.

Perceval Smarte, B. A., of the university of Oxford, was a great example amongst us of this sort. It was almost a pity that a gentleman with so accurate an should have been restricted in the choice of vesteye for colour, and with so chaste a notion of costume, ments by the nature of his profession. The canon relating to ecclesiastical attire might have been suspended in his particular case with the greatest safety, and without risk of the case so carefully guarded against, of a scarlet clergyman with yellow stripes. He once shewed me a whole drawerful of lemon-coloured kid-gloves, almost all new, which he had amassed during his lay career, and which he had no intention whatever of wearing again.

'It seems hard, does it not?' sighed Perceval Smarte-and I think there was a dewiness in his large blue eyes when he said it-'but we must all make our little sacrifices.' What, however, the strict letter of the highest church-discipline did permit him in garments, he took the fullest advantage of. I never yet saw a curate in canonicals who had such an exceeding resemblance to a bishop. Upon one occasion, when the clerk was indisposed, I went into the vestry with our curate to assist him in attiring himself, and I shall not easily forget it. I only wish I knew the technical names for half the things-the under-garments-in which I invested him. A certain black silk waistcoat, which reached down to his hips, was fastened-I remember that at the back of his right shoulder; and there was an enormous agate brooch, with a black cross upon it, the pin of which, in my clumsy attempts to fasten it, I ran into his neck. His surplice was, I suppose, lawn of a dazzling whiteness, made to stick out in all directions, as though inflated: this, while he remained at Little Biddlebrigham, was washed every week. His immediate predecessor had not been so particular in this matter, and wore one of a very different material. Perceval Smarte, who assisted him upon the last Sunday of his stay with us, is said to have observed to him sarcastically: 'I think, my friend, if I did borrow a table-cloth to read prayers in, I would try to procure a clean one.' Besides attending to his duties in the parish very assiduously, Mr Smarte took the taste of our young ladies under his entire control; not a gown was chosen without an eye to his

approbation, not a bonnet selected without the inward reflection: Now, I wonder what will our curate say to this!' I must confess that I think he abused his elevated position in the pulpit to scrutinise, before the service commenced, the novelties' recently imported by his fair parishioners, for I always noticed that he was most severe upon them on Monday mornings. He was not a poor man-or he could not have stopped so long as he did at Little Biddlebrigham, where a nonresident rector offers the hope of a recompense far higher than any mere pecuniary reward,' and indeed does not, I believe, ever insult our curates by the proffer of a stipend. He had a very comfortable little bachelor establishment; and his sister sometimes came and stayed with him, who was the superior of some sort of amateur convent in the north, and wore a very becoming dress, which distinguished, as she loved to call it, her 'order.' While she remained, there was a series of festivities given by Mr Perceval Smarte: such snowy napkins, such glistening plate, ay, and wine, too, of such first-rate excellence, as was not to be surpassed at the squire's (Mr Broadland's) own table at the hall. I remember but one mischance at these entertainments of our curate, and that, I think, happened the winter before last. Mr Smarte had an infinite deal of trouble in getting men-servants to his liking out of our parish, and the one he had then, a certain Samuel Scroggin, was only upon trial. This poor fellow had never seen such things as hot-water plates before, nor did he at all imagine that their duty was to keep our food warm: he opined, indeed, from their form and character, that they were intended for quite another purpose; and when we trooped down into the dining-room, we found them garnishing each individual chair-Samuel had thought they were to sit upon in that cold weather. That was the only occasion upon which the Rev. Perceval was ever known to use a naughty expression, and the lady-superior strove in vain to drown it by a cough.

He was a very good man, and a very kind man, I do believe, although he had not much judgment in managing the vestry, and made a great deal of fuss about a parcel of saints and martyrs, whom nobody at Little Biddlebrigham had ever so much as heard the names of. I, for one, was very sorry when that tremendous disturbance took place about the wax-candles, with which the whole world is now sufficiently acquainted, and our parish in particular was convulsed. He was a better man, I believe, after all, than the Rev. Curte Sharpely who succeeded him.

Mr Sharpely was a scholar of that magnitude, that one could never understand above half his sermons, and the other half was devoted to personalities. Upon the very second Sunday of his preaching, he flew at the poor squire for having a guest in his house who had peculiar opinions, and did not come to church. He asked us all what was our opinion of that man who could take tea with a deist; and the squire and his family walked straight out of their pew at once, followed by all their servants, and by the sexton, who is also the squire's gardener. The clerk himself was seen to vacillate at his desk, doubtful whether his allegiance was most due to his temporal or spiritual head. Altogether, the scene was of a character not easily to be erased from the mind of a Little Biddlebrighamer. Mr Curte Sharpely had a great deal to contend against in our parish after this; and it was wonderful that he effected so much good as he really did. He had, however, a very strong will, and frightened our village schoolmaster a great deal more than the schoolmaster could ever frighten the boys; the mistress alone stood up against him womanfully, declining to work his somewhat exacting behests, upon the ground that she was not a clergyman, nor able to perform impossibilities.' He made himself acquainted with the weak points of everybody's character, with the

skeleton in everybody's house, with the unpleasantnesses that had taken place in every family in Little Biddlebrigham, and by these means attained considerable power, without making a single friend. The neighbouring clergy disliked our little curate; but at their district theological meetings he took the lead, and was by no means to be put down. The bishop, it was rumoured, had asked his opinion upon a Hebrew passage, when he came down hither to confirm; the archdeacon did not venture to patronise him; the rural dean desisted from his usual rubber upon the night when our curate dined with him. Nobody dined with Mr Curte Sharpely; he had cold meat at his meals in preference to hot, and drank with them some peculiar effervescent mixture of his own contriving, which, I believe, turned acid upon his stomach, and in some degree accounted for his disposition. His study and accurate knowledge of the classics and divinity did not soften his manners, nor indeed prevent them from being absolutely ferocious. People sometimes never spoke to him more than once; nobody ever differed from him after the first time. He had a rug at his front-door with Cave canem stamped upon it, and Mr Broadland used to say it meant, 'Beware of the curate;' most of the Little Biddlebrighamers adopted a still freer translation, and held it to signify, Please to wipe your shoes.' When Mr Curte Sharpely left us, we were certainly most of us pleased, but were yet obliged to confess that he had taken the parish by the shoulders, and shoved it along the roads to health and education further than any curate who had come before him.

A very horrible thing happened in our parish after his departure. A young gentleman, the Rev. Julian Montacute, tutor in the squire's family, consented to take the services for a few weeks, until we got a minister to suit us, for our non-resident rector had been too terrified by the letters of Curte Sharpely ever to appoint another man without some trial. Mr Montacute was handsome, elegant, and had attained high honours at the universities; but he was of very tender years. We doubted whether, transferred as he was about to be from private to public life, he would muster courage enough to read and preach before Little Biddlebrigham; it was agreed among the most influential families that it would be quite excusable if he declined preaching a sermon at all. We need not, however, have given ourselves any concern about this matter, as Mr Julian Montacute not only read with great judgment and perfect nerve, but also astonished us with one of the most beautiful flights of extempore pulpit oratory with which our parish has been favoured. As learned as Curte Sharpely, as dignified as Perceval Smarte, this young man had, besides, a store of pathos and a charm of delivery that were peculiarly his own. There was scarcely a lady without a pocket-handkerchief; and in the squire's pew, Miss EleanorBut there, I will repeat no domestic scandal; the misadventure of our whole parish with Mr Julian Montacute is surely of itself sufficiently interesting. The whole congregation, in short, was delighted; nor was there a tea-party in Little Biddlebrigham for weeks where the eloquence of our young divine was not the unfailing theme of praise.

On the next Sunday, the Wesleyan chapel was deserted; and the Ranter at the slate-quarry on the hill preached to empty air. The church was filled to its porch with a crowd of eager listeners, and again the Rev. Julian Montacute won every ear and moistened every eye. Two young ladies, who were about to be married in our parish, entreated as a particular favour that they should be united by his graceful hands; but he delicately declined to perform this ceremony for them. Several young ladies not about to be married But again, let me confine myself to our public misfortune-in a word, our minister was the

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