scandal in John's neighbourhood. People begin to look wise, and shake their heads, whenever his affairs are mentioned. They all "hope that matters are not so bad with him as represented; but when a man's own children begin to rail at his extravagance, things must be badly managed. They understand he is mortgaged over head and ears, and is continually dabbling with money lenders. He is certainly an open handed old gentleman, but they fear he has lived too fast; indeed, they never knew any good come of this fondness for hunting, racing, revelling, and prize fighting. In short, Mr. Bull's estate is a very fine one, and has been in the family a long while; but for all that, they have known many finer estates come to the hammer."

What is worst of all, is the effect which these pecuniary embarrassments and domestic feuds have had on the poor man himself. Instead of that jolly round corporation, and snug rosy face, which he used to present, he has of late become as shrivelled and shrunk as a frost-bitten apple. His scarlet gold-laced waistcoat, which bellied out so bravely in those prosperous days when he sailed before the wind, now hangs loosely about him, like a mainsail in a calm. His leather breeches are all in folds and wrinkles; and apparently have much ado to hold up the boots that yawn on both sides of his once sturdy legs.

Instead of strutting about as formerly, with his three-cornered hat on one side; flourishing his cudgel, and bringing it down every moment with a hearty thump upon the ground; looking every one sturdily in the face, and trolling out a stave of a catch or a drinking song; he now goes about whistling thoughtfully to himself, with his head drooping down, his cudgel tucked under his arm, and his hands thrust to the bottom of his breeches pockets, which are evidently empty.

Such is the plight of honest John Bull at present; yet for all this, the old fellow's spirit is as tall and as gallant as ever. If you drop the least expression of sympathy or concern, he takes fire in an instant; swears that he is the richest and stoutest fellow in the country; talks of laying out large sums to adorn his house or to buy another estate; and, with a valiant swagger and grasping of his cudgel, longs exceedingly to have another bout at quarter-staff.

Though there may be something rather whimsical in all this, yet I confess I cannot look upon John's situation without strong feelings of interest. With all his odd humours and obstinate prejudices, he is a sterling-hearted old blade. He may not be so wonderfully fine a fellow as he thinks himself, but he is at least twice as good as his neighbours represent him. His virtues are all his own; all plain, homebred, and unaffected. His very faults smack of the raciness of his good qualities. His extravagance savours of his generosity; his quarrelsomeness of his courage; his credulity of his open faith; his vanity of his pride; and his bluntness of his sincerity. They are all the redundancies of a rich and liberal character. He is like his own oak, rough without, but sound and solid within; whose bark abounds with excrescences in proportion to the growth and grandeur of the timber; and whose branches make a fearful groaning and murmuring in the least storm, from their very magnitude and luxuriance. There is something, too, in the appearance of this old family mansion that is extremely poetical and picturesque: and, as long as it can be rendered comfortably habitable, I should almost tremble to see it meddled with during the present conflict of tastes and opinions. Some of his advisers are no doubt good architects, that might be of service; but many, I fear, are mere levellers,who,when they had once got to work with their mattocks on the venerable edifice, would never stop until they had brought it to the ground, and perhaps buried themselves among the ruins. All that I wish is, that John's present troubles may teach him more prudence in future. That he may cease to distress his mind about other people's affairs; that he may give up the fruitless attempt to promote the good of his neighbours, and the peace and happiness of the world, by dint of the cudgel; that he may remain quietly at home; gradually get his house into repair; cultivate his rich estate according to his fancy; husband his income-if he thinks proper; bring his unruly children into order-if he can; renew the jovial scenes of ancient prosperity; and long enjoy, on his paternal lands, a green, an honourable, and a merry old age.

DR. JOHNSON'S PROBITY.

Dr. Johnson was so accustomed to say always the exact truth, that he never condescended to give an equivocal answer to any question; of which the following is an instance:-a lady of his acquaintance once asked him how it happened, that he was never invited to the tables of the great? He replied," because, madam, great lords and ladies do not like to have their mouths stopped."

of pride, and cement the bond of family friendship. It is well known that sacrifices were always followed by a feast, to which both friends and relations were invited. The symbol, taken in the last sense, gives reason to suppose that the ancients were always inclined to refuse to their poor relations admittance to those ceremonies at which decency required their presence, and to treat them with the same contempt as the extremity of their nails, which they cut off, and threw from them.

LUCKY AND UNLUCKY DAYS.

Though day follows day, they bear no resemblance to each other."

This proverbial sentence is applicable to the ideas of such people as, on particular days, are afraid to perform certain indifferent actions, from the dread of incurring some danger, or, as they term it, ill luck; a species of superstition which has come from the Chaldeans through the means of Pythagoras. That philosopher believed that there were particular days and hours proper for the performance of particular ceremonies, and other days and hours improper for those purposes; and on this belief he founded a species of precept, which is still followed by weak minds, who, for example, among many other similar instances of folly, would not, on any account, cut their nails on a Friday. It is probable that this ridiculous idea is derived from the symbol of Pythagoras, which forbids to pare the nails during the sacrifice, ad sacrificium ungues ne præcidito. Ignorant Christians having taken this precept in its literal sense, have applied it to Friday, the day on which the Holy Author of our religion completed his generous sacrifice. Beneath the symbol of Pythagoras, however, was concealed an excellent precept of morality-namely, "That during the time of prayer, our thoughts should be solely bent on the Deity, and every base and unworthy sentiment expelled from the mind." Another explanation of the above symbol has also been given by an ancient author, who says, that Pythagoras meant thereby to enforce the necessity of assembling, when any one offered a sacrifice, all his relations, however distant, or however poor; for that such an act of piety should banish all ideas

BIOGRAPHY.

SIR FRANCIS DRAKE. "A Drake who made thee mistress of the deep, And bore thy name in thunder round the world." THOMSON,

This renowned British warrior and circumnavigator was son to Edmund Drake, a common sailor, born near Tavistock, in Devonshire, in the year 1545. In his early youth he was sent to sea with Sir John Hawkins, and soon shewed the dawn of great expectation, which met with due promotion. In 1570 he went to the West Indies with two ships of war, where he met with great success. In 1572 he made another successful expedition. In 1577 Drake, who had now acquired the reputation of a skilful seaman, obtained the command of a squadron of five ships, with which he made a voyage to the Spanish settlements in South America, and sailed as far as 48 degrees north latitude, giving the name of New Albion to the country he discovered. He afterwards sailed to the East Indies, and having doubled the Cape of Good Hope, he returned to Portsmouth; which voyage round the world took up nearly two years and ten months. On his return from this enterprise, he had the honour to entertain Queen Elizabeth on board his ship at Deptford, where her Majesty conferred on him the honour of knighthood. Queen Elizabeth is well known to have been frugal in the distribution of titles; none of her worthies were carpet knights, but men whose wisdom or valour rather dignified than received any lustre from the honours conferred by their sovereign. In 1585 Sir Francis

* Sir John Hawkins died off Porto Rico in 1590.

Drake sailed on another expedition, and returned with great booty. In 1587 he commanded a fleet of thirty sail, with which he attacked and destroyed a number of ships in the harbour of Cadiz; and in the year following he signalized himself as Vice-Admiral, under Lord Howard, in the defeat of the supposed invincible Armada. Sir Francis Drake had now arrived at the summit of fame as a British Admiral, and in the year 1595 he again put to sea with a fleet of twenty-eight sail of the line, and was equally skilful, intrepid, and successful, as a soldier and sailor. In 1599 he terminated his glorious career at sea in his own ship, in the West Indies; where he died near the town of Nombre de Dios, aged 54*, and like our late celebrated circumnavigator, Captain Cookt, was buried in the sea. Thus the element which had been the principal theatre of his achievements, was eventually his tomb; but the memory of his nautical skill and patriotic zeal, will ever be honoured by his grateful country.

men.

THEATRES IN LONDON.

Such was the fondness of our forefathers for dramatic entertainments, that no fewer than nineteen playhouses had been opened, at different times, before the year 1533. In the reign of Charles I, and II. there were six playhouses allowed to be opened at one time in London, that is, at Blackfriars, or the King's company; the Globe, on the Bank Side; the Bull, in St. John

Another account says, Sir Francis Drake

died January 28th, 1596; if this is true, he died

the same age as Captain Cook.

+ Captain James Cook, F. R. S. was son to a poor labouring man (a common husbandman). This renowned circumnavigator was born Oc tober 27th, (some say November 3d) 1728, at Marton, in the North Riding of Yorkshire. His first voyage round the world was in 1768-69-70 and 71; his second, 1772-73-74 and 75; his third, 1776-77-78-79 and 80. When in England he ge nerally lived at Stepney. He was killed by savages at Owyhee, one of the Sandwich Islands in the Pacific Ocean, February 14th, 1779, in his 51st year, and was buried in the sea. It has been observed-0, why he? why not another less worthy? There is an excellent print of the death of Captain Cook, engraved (the figures) by Sir Francis Bartolozzi, R. A. engraver to his late Majesty, and the landscape by William Byrne, the excellent landscape engraver, from a picture by John Webber, R. A. who sailed as draughtsman with Captain Cook. The best portrait of Captain Cook is that engraved by John Keys Sheridan, also engraver to his late Majesty, and who was pupil to Sir Francis Bartolozzi.

street: one in Salisbury-court; the Fortune and the Cock-pit in Drurylane. The price of admission to the play-house called the Globe, in Shakspeare's time, about 1603, was one shilling to the boxes, and sixpence to the pit, and a twopenny gallery is mentioned in the prologue to Beaumont and Fletcher's Woman Hater. Seats of three-pence and a groat are also mentioned, and afterwards, to some of the houses, the prices were from sixpence up to two shillings and sixpence. At the theatre in Drury-lane, in 1703, the price to the boxes was four shillings, to the pit two shillings and sixpence, the first gallery one shilling and sixpence, and upper gallery one shilling. Many years after that period the price to the boxes was raised to five shillings, the pit to three shillings, and the first gallery to two shillings.

The amusements, before the commencement of the play, were of various kinds. While some part of the audience entertained themselves with reading, or playing at cards, others were employed in less refined occupations-in drinking ale or smoking tobacco; with these, and nuts and apples, they were furnished by male writer of the time of James I. loudly attendants, of whose clamour a satirical complains:

Notes from Black Friars, by H. FitzJeoffrey, 1617.

By the following passages from Prynne's Histriomastix, published in 1633, it appears that, at that period, tobacco was commonly smoked in the play-houses, not only by men, but by according to their several qualities, women." How many are there, who spend 2d. 3d. 4d. 6d. 12d. 18d. 28. and sometimes 4 s. or 5 s. at play-house, day by day, if coach-hire, boat-hire, tobacco, wine, beere, and such like vaine expenses be cast into the reckoning!" p. 322.

"In Rome, it was the fashion for wanton young men to place themselves as nigh as they could to the courtezans, to present them pomegranetes, to play with their garments, and waite on them home when the sporte was done. In the play-houses at London, they offer them the tobacco-pipe, which was then unknown." p. 363.