rearing scarlet-runners, poulterers for hen-bane, tailors for cabbage, and physicians for truffles, or any thing that requires to be quickly buried. I could have raised a few bachelors' buttons from the bones of that class; but as nobody cares a button for bachelors, I did not think it worth while. As a general remark it may be noticed, that young people produce the passionflower in abundance, while those of a more advanced age may be beneficially used for the elder-tree, the sloe, and snapdragon; and with respect to different nations, my experiments are only sufficiently advanced to enable me to state that Frenchmen are favourable to garlic, and that Poles are very good for hops. Of mint I have never been able to raise much; but as to thyme, I have so large a supply, as the reader will easily perceive, that I am enabled to throw it away; and as he may not possibly be in a similar predicament, I shall refer him for the rest of my experiments to the records of the Horticultural Society.

PITCAIRN'S ISLAND.

Can such things be,

And overcome us like a summer cloud,
Without our special wonder?

SHAKSPEARE.

In the Spring of last year I landed with a watering party from the American brig Washington upon the remote Island of Pitcairn, where the mutineers of the

Bounty have establised a colony of English faces, and awakened echoes of the English tongue, amid the unexplored solitudes of the great Pacific Ocean. To me as a Briton every thing I beheld was intensely interesting;-the recognised countenances of my country, as exhibited in the male population-the soft skins and olive hue of the elderly females-the blended characteristics of both races in the younger inhabitants of either sex-the incipient corruption of the language by the adoption of Otaheitean terms and pronunciation-the strange incongruous union of civilization and barbarism,—were all so many distinct objects of curious speculation. Declining the proffered hospitality of the natives, I struck inland towards a hill at some distance, from whose summit I conjectured that I could easily command the whole limited extent of the country. On the side where I ascended there were but partial marks of cultivation, but the whole surface was a natural garden of palm, cocoa-nut, banana, and plantain trees, interspersed with guava and orange; and never had I beheld a more magnificent sun-set than that which burst upon my vision when I gained the top. Not a cloud floated in the horizonthe great orb of fire seemed to be sinking into an ocean of molten gold, the glowing waves heaving towards the shore with a slow and majestic undulation, while the sky exhibited every gradation of tint from the intensity of light to the rosy flushes and mellow purple of evening. While I was yet gazing, another and more silvery light seemed to steal across the heavens; and turning to the opposite quarter, I beheld the full moon

ascending with solemn splendour, although the rival luminary was yet more than half visible. Such was the transparency of the atmosphere, that notwithstanding this plenitude of light, the planets and constellations already began to sparkle in their blue depths with a fullness of brilliancy unknown in our northern latitudes. One might have thought it was a jubilee in heaven-that all its glorious magnificence was put forth; and as I contemplated the sky, and sea, and earth, and all the sublime pageant of creation, I felt lifted above humanity and its petty thoughts, and brought into a holy and ineffable communion with the great Creator.

Descending on the opposite side of the hill, whose broken and uneven declivity presently reconducted me towards the shore, I sat myself down at the foot of a projecting rock, from which a cascade fell into a beautiful little lake, and flowing out again at the other extremity in the form of a meandering runnel, was presently lost in the sea. Tufts of scattered water-lilies alternately caught and lost the brightness of the moonbeam as they danced upon the troubled surface of the waves in the vicinity of the cascade; and towards the centre of the lake there was a pigmy island of not more than twenty yards diameter. Nature seemed to have wrought every thing in miniature, yet with a surpassing beauty and exquisite proportion. Notwithstanding the rich verdure of the little floating garden, and the garland of flowers with which it was belted round, I observed in the middle one of those barren circles denominated Fairy-rings; and while I was wondering

whether those tiny elves ever visited this sequestered and romantic nook, and in what language they would be found to discourse if their parleyings became audible to mortal ears, I heard a low and mellow symphony, as if of Eolian harps, but withal more musical and delicate. Looking round to discover its source, I could behold nothing but the serene and silent moon, from whose full orb a bar of rippling light ran along the sea, appearing to terminate at my very feet. A schoolboy might have fancied that he was holding an illuminated kite by a cord of silver, and Endymion would gladly have favoured the same imagination that he might send his heart up as a messenger to the goddess whom it adored. For myself, I could only dream that I was brought by that connecting stream of light into some sort of communication with the inhabitants of the moon, if such indeed there be, or at all events with the traditionary old man who sits in that desolate sphere with no other accompaniments than his lantern and bush.

Again the same symphony breathed around me, appearing now to proceed from the little island, towards which I turned; and as I beheld the hyacinths and snowdrops, campanulas and lilies of the valley, all shaking their little white bells in the breeze, I could not help conceiting that from their silvery turrets they had rung out that floral music upon the wind, so liquid was it, so sweet and gracious, so like some rich spontaneous modulation of the air. But who shall describe my astonishment when, in the midst of the magic circle I have before mentioned, and in the full

lustre of the moonbeams, I beheld a company of fairies surrounding one who lay extended as if in death, and who, from the crown upon his head which shook out a dazzling splendour, appeared to have been their king. She whom I conjectured to be their queen, advancing before the others, knelt down beside the body, and placing her hand upon its bosom, exclaimed in a birdlike voice, but infinitely "more tuneable than lark to shepherd's ear,"

"Feel his heart,'tis cold as stone!

He's dead-dead-quite dead and gone!
While in a water-lily sleeping,

Down came the mountain-torrent sweeping,
And, before my love could fly,

Dash'd him on the rocks-to die !"

Hereupon the symphony was renewed, and the rest of the company gathering round the mourner, endeavoured to console her in the following choral dirge:"Mourn no longer his mishap,

Move, oh move him from thy lap;
Braid no more his golden locks,
All dishevell❜d by the rocks,

And his face of marble hue
With thy tears no more bedew.

All our fairy troops shall hover

Round the hearse that bears thy lover,

And his bright remains shall be

Sepulchred right royally."

But the widowed Queen of Shadows ejaculated in a tone of still more impassioned grief—

"From these arms he shall not stir,

These shall be his sepulchre ;