On March 28th, 1738, died Mrs Ithell, wife of Benedict Ithell, deputy paymaster of Chelsea college, respecting whom, or Mrs. Ithell, nothing more is known than that Mrs. Ithell's death, upon this day, affords the opportunity of stating that she was wife to Mr. Ithell, and that Mr. Ithell appears, from his surname, to have been of Welsh extraction, which leads to this remark that almost all the Welsh families have what were anciently only baptismal ones, as Morgan, Williams, Jones, Cadwallader, Ithell, &c., with a long train of others, annexed by " Ap," which is synonymous with "Ben" in Hebrew, "Fitz" in French, "Vitz" in Russian, and "Son" in the Danish language; except that, when the Welsh adopted surnames, which is a late thing with them, they abbreviated the "Ap," by putting the final letter as the prefix to the surname: as, Powel, Parry, Proger, Prichard, Pugh, &c., instead of Ap-Owel, Ap-Harry, Ap-Roger, Ap-Richard, Ap-Hugh.t

full fifteen hands high, gone after the hounds many times, rising six years and no more; moves as well as most creatures upon earth, as good a road mare as any in ten counties, and ten to that; trots at a confounded pace; is from the country, and her owner will sell her for nine guineas; if some folks had her she would fetch near three times the money. I have no acquaintance, and money I want; and a service in a shop to carry parcels, or to be in a gentleman's service. My father gave me the mare to get rid of me, and to try my fortune in London; and I am just come from Shropshire, and I can be recommended, as I suppose nobody takes servants without, and have a voucher for my mare. Enquire for me at the Talbot Inn, near the New Church in the Strand.-A. R."

In Wimbledon church, Surrey, is the following inscription by the Rev. Mr. Cooksoy, the minister,-To THE MEMORY Of JOHN MARTENS, a gardener, a native of Portugal, who cultivated here, with industry and success, the same ground under three masters [a Mr. Bish, who brought him from Portugal,-Bish Richards, esq.,

and sir Henry Banks, knight,] forty years. Though skilful and experienced, he was modest and unassuming; and though faithful to his masters, and with reason esteemed, he was kind to his fellow servants, and was therefore beloved. His family and neighbours lamented his death, as he was a careful husband, a tender father, and an honest man. This character is given to posterity by his last master, willingly, because deservedly, as a lasting testimony of his great regard for so good a servant. He died March 30, 1760, aged 66.

"To public service grateful nations raise Proud structures, which excite to deeds of praise;

While private services in corners thrown,
Howe'er deserving, never gain one stone.
But are not lilies, which the valleys hide,
Perfect as cedars, though the mountain's
pride?

Every page of Clare's "Shepherd's Calendar" teems with charming scenery, which the pencil might transfer, or the imagination work out upon the canvas. How joyously some of his stanzas repre

sent

APRIL!

In wanton gambols, like a child,
She tends her early toils,
And seeks the buds along the wild

That blossoms while she smiles;

Or, laughing on, with nought to chide,
She races with the Hours,
Or sports by Nature's lovely side,
And fills her lap with flowers.

The field and garden's lovely hours

Begin and end with thee;

For what's so sweet as peeping flowers
And bursting buds to see,
What time the dew's unsullied drops,
In burnish'd gold, distil
On crocus flowers' unclosing tops,
And drooping daffodil!

Along cach hedge and sprouting bush
The singing birds are blest,
And linnet green and speckled thrush

Prepare their mossy nest;
On the warm bed thy plains supply,
The young lambs find repose,
And 'mid thy green hills basking lie,
Like spots of ling'ring snows.
Thy open'd leaves, and ripen'd buds,
The cuckoo makes his choice,
And shepherds in thy greening woods
First hear his cheering voice:
And to thy ripen'd blooming bowers
The nightingale belongs;
And, singing to thy parting hours,

Keeps night awake with songs!
With thee the swallow dares to come,

And cool his sultry wing;
And, urged to seek his yearly home,
Thy suns the martin bring.
Oh! lovely Month! be leisure mine
Thy yearly mate to be;

Though May-day scenes may brighter shine,
Their birth belongs to thee.

I waked me with thy rising sun,
And thy first glories viewed,
And, as thy welcome hours begun,
Their sunny steps pursued.
And now thy sun is on thee set,

Like to a lovely eve,

I view thy parting with regret,
And linger, loath to leave.-

A correspondent selects, chiefly from our elder writers, some beautiful passages on the Spring, which bursts upon us in this sweet month. Poets sing of it as a jubilee of life, love, and liberty, to nature.

wings ;

from her etherial

And music on the waves and woods she flings, And love on all that lives, and calm on lifeless things.

Hail, lovely season! thrice beautiful in thy timid guilelessness, thy sweet confiding innocence! I welcome thee with placid joy. To me thou hast ever brought renewed hopes and happy anticipations. I was taught by thee to listen to

The echoes of the human world, which tell
Of the low voice of love, almost unheard,
And dove-eyed pity's murmured pain, and
music,

Itself the echo of the heart, and all
That tempers or improves man's life.

Reader-Art thou discomforted by unwelcome truths and sad realities? - Dost thou "relapse into cutting remembrances?" -Are thy feelings "kept raw by the edge of repetition?"-Is thy spirit discomposed by the rude jostle of society ?-Dost thou loathe the cold glitter of false and fashionable life, the endless impertinences of worldly-minded men? - Dost thou desire

-and thou wilt be the better for it all the year after. We will indulge in sweet thoughts and solacing interchanges of kindly feeling.

And now we are in aquiet, rural spot, far from the busy hum of men,

-so that a whispering blade

Of grass, a wailful gnat, a bee, bustling
Down in the blue-bells, or a wren light rustling
Among the leaves and twigs, might all be
heard.

No sound strikes upon our ear but the grate ful music of nature. "There is a spirit of youth in every thing."

Through wood, and stream, and hill, and field,

and ocean,

A quickening life from the earth's heart has burst,

As it has ever done.

"Fresh leaves and flowers deck the dead season's bier ;" and, ah!-there is one of them the primrose! See how it peeps from yon southern mossy bank, pale and motionless" not wagging its

sweet

head," so hushed and still is the atmosphere, that there is not even a playful breeze abroad "to fondle the flowerets in its soft embrace." This darling flower, this early child of spring, "that comes before the swallow dares, and takes the winds of March with beauty," is my peculiar favorite. I never meet with a tuft of them for the first time, but there goes to my heart an intense feeling of their calm and innocent loveliness. They are to me heralds of young and fresh-bursting life, dear pledges of the renewed existence of nature. They tell me of the vernal joys that are at hand, awaiting me. feeling I experience at every returning season: it is connected with many an early association. I delight to follow and trace it far back, into the years of childhood,

This

And find no end, in wandering mazes lost. I can discover nothing but "the man's thoughts dark within the infant's brain." How mysterious are the operations of the mind at that budding period! To what point of our infancy are we to refer the first dim and shadowy associations? How can we trace the early dawning of

that primal sympathy, Which, having been, must ever be, and which makes the same poet exclaim, in a line full of deep and philosophic thought,

"The child is father of the man?"

And then, again, by what insensible gradations do we progress to the laughing thoughtlessness of boyhood! Oh! how I love to revert to those days of careless gaiety and unrestrained freedom! Life then had no stern realities. Every object was clothed in the fairy hues of imagination. I lived and moved as in a dream; and hope was as broad and easing as the general air." Many of my happiest moments are derived from the golden heart-strings of my being,-old dwellers recollections intertwined with the very in my bosom, that ever linger with me,

And, of the past, are all that cannot pass away! Time and care make sad havoc with these aerial enjoyments.

Whither is fled the visionary gleam?

Where is it now, the glory and the dream? Youth invests all which it sees and desires with the rainbow tints of fancy; And by the vision splendid Is on its way attended; At length the man perceives it die away, And fade into the light of common day. Yet let us press on joyfully in our course. and jolly pastimes, that will fetch the day "there be delights, there be recreations,

about from sun to sun, and rock the tedious year as in a delightful dream."

What though the radiance which was once, so bright

Be now for ever taken from our sight,

Though nothing can bring back the hour Of splendor in the grass, of glory in the flower! We will grieve not, rather find Strength in what remains behind. A thousand pure pleasures remain to us. them, is natural scenery. I lately met Foremost, and the most soothing among with a passage, written some years ago, in a periodical work, which finely and feelingly expresses all that I would say on this subject. The author, writing from a lonely spot in Switzerland, describes it, and thus proceeds :

"During those dreams of the soul, which our hopes and wishes create, and our reason is unable to destroy,-when we wish to retire from the loud and stirring world, and, among the loveliness of some far-removed valley, to pass the days that fate may have assigned us,-where the mind endeavours to combine in one scene every beauteous image that memory can supply, or imagination picture,-it would be impossible to conceive the existence of a more lovely landscape. So sweet is this spot, that the very winds of heaven