or reject it. Swift pursued, it is said, a like method of reading his works to the unlearned.

ANTIQUITY OF AGRICULTURE.

The first three men in the world were a gardener, a ploughman, and a grazier; and if any man object that the second of these was a murderer, I desire he would consider, that as soon as he was so, he quitted our profession and turned builder.—Cowley.

MR. PERKINS, THE DIVINE.

He had a capacious head, with angles winding and roomy enough for all controversial intricacies. He would pronounce the word damn, with such an emphasis as left a doleful echo in his auditor's ears. a good while afterward.-Fuller.

SUSPICION.

Always to think the worst, I have ever found to be the mark of a mean spirit and a base soul.— Bolingbroke.

CANNIBALS.

Lamb writes to his friend Manning, to dissuade him from going to China, and endeavours to instill the fear of cannibals into his mind. "Some say the Tartars are cannibals, and then conceive a fellow eating my friend, and adding the cool malignity of mustard and vinegar." This reminds one of the advice Sydney Smith is said to have given to the

bishop of New Zealand, previous to his departure. recommending him to have regard to the minor 2 well as to the more grave duties of his station—to be given to hospitality—and, in order to meet the tastes of his native guests, never to be without a smoked little boy in the bacon-rack, and a cold clergyman on the sideboard. "And as for myself, my lord," he concluded, "all I can say is, that when your new parishioners do eat you, I hope you will disagree with them."

FLOGGING AT SCHOOL.

If the dead have any cognizance of posthumous fame, one would think it must abate somewhat of the pleasures with which Virgil and Ovid regard their earthly immortality, when they see to what base purposes their productions are employed. That their voices should be administered to boys in regular doses, as lessons or impositions, and some dim、conception whipped into the tail when it has failed to penetrate the head, cannot be just the sort of homage to their genius which they anticipated or desired.— The Doctor.

A DINNER-PARTY.

An excellent and well-arranged dinner, is a most pleasing occurrence, and a great triumph of civilized life. It is not only the descending morsel and the enveloping sauce, but the rank, wealth, wit, and beauty which surround the meats; the learned man

agement of light and heat; the silent and rapid services of the attendants; the smiling and sedulous host, proffering gusts and relishes; the exotic bottles; the embossed plate; the pleasant remarks; the handsome dresses; the cunning artifices in fruit and farina! The hour of dinner, in short, includes every thing of sensual and intellectual gratification, which a great nation glories in producing.--Sydney Smith.

LITERARY ENTERTAINMENTS.

Menage makes mention of a person, who occasionally gave entertainments to authors. His fancy was to place them at table, each according to the size and thickness of the volumes they had published, commencing with the folio authors, and proceeding through the quarto and octavo, down to the duodecimo, each according to his rank.

DULLNESS.

"A man," said Tom Brown, "is never ruined by dullness."

SCOLDING AND QUARRELLING

Have something of familiarity and a commnnity of interest; they imply acquaintance; they are of one sentiment, which is of the family of dearness. -Lamb.

HUMAN LIFE.

When all is done, human life is, at the greatest and the best, but like a froward child that must be

played with and humoured a little to keep it quiet till it falls asleep, and then the care is over.-Sir William Temple.

THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE.

They may talk as they will of the dead languages. Our auxiliary verbs give us a power which the ancients, with all their varieties of mood, and inflections of tense, never could obtain.-The Doctor.

EXCUSE FOR A LONG LETTER.

In a postscript to one of the "Provincial Letters,' Pascal excuses himself for the letter being so long, on the plea that he had not had time to make it shorter.

REAL MANNERS.

Good manners is the art of making those people easy with whom we converse. Whoever makes the fewest persons uneasy, is the best bred in the company.-Swift.

ECCENTRIC TASTE.

George Selwyn was noted for a passion for the details of criminal justice, from "the warrant to the rope;" and his friends always made it a point of gratifying this peculiarity, by sending him news of criminals, executions, &c. When Horace Walpole's house in Arlington-street was broken open, he dispatched a messenger to Selwyn, to inform him of the fact, and of his having secured the thief. It

happened that the person who received the message had lately been robbed himself, and had the wound. fresh in his mind. "He stalked up into the clubroom," relates Walpole, "stopped short, and with a hollow trembling voice said, 'Mr. Selwyn, Mr. Walpole's compliments, and he's got a housebreaker for you."

JOHN RANDOLPH.

The celebrated John Randolph not wishing to reply to a disagreeable question put to him in Congress, evaded it by saying, "Sir, that is a question, and I never answer questions."

DUELLING,

Though barbarous in civilized, is a highly civilized institution among barbarous people; and when compared to assassination, is a prodigious victory gained over human passions.-Sydney Smith.

APES.

Human creatures who were left unfinished because they were made so late on Saturday that the Sunday put a stop to the work.-Southey.

FASTIDIOUS TASTES.

A fastidious taste is like a squeamish appetite: the one has its origin in some disease of the mind, as the other has in some ailment of the stomach.The Doctor.