Paul Van Somer, an artist of great merit, born at Antwerp in 1576, died in London, and was buried at St. Martins in the fields on the 5th of January 1621. His pencil was chiefly employed on portraits of royal, noble, and eminent personages. He painted James I. at Windsor, and Hampton Court; the lord chancellor Bacon, and his brother Nicholas, at Gorhambury; Thomas Howard earl of Arundel, and his lady Alathea Talbot, at Worksop; William earl of Pembroke, at St. James's; and the fine whole-length of the first earl of Devonshire in his robes, “equal," says Walpole "to the pencil of Vandyke, and one of the finest single figures I have seen."

Van Somer seems to have been the first of those artists who, after the accession of James I., arrived and established themselves in England and practised a skilful management of the chiaro-scuro. His portraits were admired for great elegance of attitude, and remarkable blance.

resem

It was fortunate for the arts that king James had no liking towards them and let them take their own course; for he would probably have meddled to introduce as bad a taste in art as he did in literature. Hayley says,

James, both for empire and for arts unfit,

His sense a quibble, and a pun his wit,
Whatever works he patronised debased;
But happy left the pencil undisgraced.

Zeuxis, the renowned painter of antiquity, flourished 400 years before the birth of Christ, and raised to great perfection the art which the labours of Apol

* Walpole's Painters.

lodorus had obtained to be esteemed. Zeuxis invented the disposition of light and shadow, ard was distinguished fo coloring. He excelled in painting females: his most celebrated production was a picture of Helen, for which five of the loveliest virgins of Crotona in Italy sat to him by order of the council of the city. Yet he is said to have lost the prize for painting in a contest with Parrhasius. The story runs, that Zeuxis's picture represented grapes so naturally that the birds flew down to peck at them; and that Parrhasius's picture represented a curtain, which Zeuxis taking to be a real one desired to be drawn aside to exhibit what his adversary had done: On finding his mistake, he said that he had only deceived birds, whereas Parrhasius had deceived a master of the art. To some who blamed his slowness in working, he answered, that it was true he was long in painting his designs, but they were designed for posterity. One of his best pieces was Hercules in his cradle strangling serpents in the sight of his affrighted mother; but he himself preferred his picture of a wrestler, under which he wrote, "It is more easy to blame than to imitate this picture." He is the first painter we read of who exhibited the productions of his pencil for money.*

Zeuxis was succeeded by Apelles, who never passed a day without handling his pencil, and painted such admirable likenesses, that they were studied by the pbysiognomists.

We speak of the Romans as ancients; the Romans spoke of the Greeks as ancients; and the Greeks of the Egyptians as their ancients. It is certain that from

them they derived most of their knowledge in art and science. If the learning of Egypt were now in the world, our attainments would dwindle into nothingness. The tombs and mummies of the Egyptians show their skill in the preparation of colors and that they practised the arts of design and painting. Vast monuments of their mighty powers in architecture and sculpture still remain. We derive from them, through the Greeks, the signs of the zodiac.

The Greeks painted on canvas or linen, placed their pictures in frames, and decorated their walls with designs in fresco. Their sculpture contained portraits of dis

* Bayle.

There are that three nightes onely do
perfourme this foolish geare,
To this intent, aad thinke themselues
in safetie all the yeare*

It appears that in the reign of Alfred a law was made relative to holidays which ordained the twelve days after the nativity to be kept as festivals.†

The grand state of the Sovereign, on Twefth day, and the manner of keeping festival at court, in the reign of king Henry VII., are set forth in Le Neve's MS. called the Royalle Book, " to the following effect:

As for Twelfth Day the king must go crowned in his royal robes, kirtle, surcoat, his furred hood about his neck, his mantle with a long train, and his cutlas before him; his armills upon his arms, of gold set full of rich stones; and no temporal man to touch it, but the king himself; and the squire for the body must bring it to the king in a fair kercheif, and the king must put them on himself; and he must have his sceptre in his right hand, and the ball with the cross in the left hand, and the crown upon his head. And he must offer that day gold, myrrh, and sense; then must the dean of the chapel send unto the archbishop of Canterbury by clerk or priest the king's offering that day; and then must the archbishop give the next benefice that falleth in his gift to the same messenger. And then the king must change his mantle when he goeth to meat, and take off his hood and lay it about his neck, and clasp it before with a great rich ouche; and this must be of the same color that he offered in. And the queen in the same form when she is crowned.

The same day that he goeth crowned he ought to go to matins ; to which array belongeth his kirtle, surcoat, tabard, and his furred hood slyved over his head, and rolled about his neck; and on his head his cap of estate, and his sword before him.

At even song he must go in his kirtle, and surcoat, and hood laid about his shoulders, and clasp the tippet and hood together before his breast with a great rich ouche, and his hat of estate upon his head.

As for the Void on the Twelfth night the king and the queen ought to have it in the hall. And as for the wassail, the steward, the treasurer, and the controller,

Naogeorgus, Popish Kingdome. † Collier's Eccles. Hist.

shall come for it with their staves in their hands; the king's sewer and the queen's having fair towels about their necks, and dishes in their hands, such as the king and the queen shall eat of: the king's carvers and the queen's shall come after with chargers or dishes, such as the king or the queen shall eat of, and with towels about their necks. And no man shall bear any thing unless sworn for three months. And the steward, treasurer, comptroller, and marshal of the hall shall ordain for all the hall, And, if it be in the great chamber, then shall the chamberlain and usbers ordain after the above form; And if there be a Bishop, his own squire, or else the king's, such as the officers choose to assign, shall serve him: And so of all the other estates, if they be dukes or earls; and so of duchesses and countesses. And then there must come in the ushers of the chamber with the pile of cups, the king's cups and the queen's, and the bishop's, with the butlers and wine to the cupboard, and then a squire for the body to bear the cup, and another for the queen's cup, such as is sworn for hire.

The [singers of the chapel] may stand at the one side of the hall: and when the steward cometh in at the hall door, with the wassail, he must cry thrice" Wassaile,"&c., and then shall the chapel answer it anon with a good song: and thus in like wise if it please the king to keep the great chamber. And then when the king and queen have done they will go in to the chamber. And there belongeth, for the king, two lights with the void, and two lights with the cup; and for the queen as many.*

Few are unmoved by either agreeable or painful feelings, on account of ancient customs coming to their notice. We are in general similarly, and more affected by recollections of sports familiar and lear to our childhood, which man, more than time, has changed, sometimes really, and always to our thinking, for the worse. In this place it is convenient to arrange for an engraving on the next page, and there not being a subject appropriate to a design for the day under notice, I presume, under favor, upon introducing a brief notice, with an engraving of an old place which I knew when a child, and which when I see or think of it, associates with some of my fondest remembrances.

Antiq. Rep..

These premises are at the corner of the Hampstead Road, and the New Road to Paddington, which is the site of the old manor house of Toten Hall. This was a lordship belonging to the deans of St. Paul's Cathedral at the time of the Norman conquest. In 1560 it demised to the crown, and has always since been held on lease. In 1768 the manor vested in Lord Southampton, whose heirs pay an annuity, in lieu of a reserved rent, to the prebendary of Tottenham. Contiguons to the Adam and Eve, and near the reservoir of the New River Company, in the Hampstead road, there was lately standing an ancient house, called, in various old records, King John's Palace.

The Adam and Eve is now denominated a coffee-house, and that part which has been built of late years, and fronts the Paddington New road, with the signboard at the top corner, is used for tavern purposes, and connects with the older part of the building; the entrance to which is through the gateway with the lamp over it, in the Ilampstead road. Within my recollection it was a house standing

alone, with spacious gardens in the rear and at the sides, and a fore-court with large timber trees, and tables and benches for out-of-door customers. In the gardens were fruit-trees, and bowers, and arbours, for tea-drinking parties. In the rear there were not any houses; now there is a town.

At that time the " Adam and Eve Tea Gardens" were resorted to by thousands, as the end of a short walk into the country; and the trees were allowed to grow and expand naturally, unrestricted by art or fashion, which then were unknown to many such places as this, and others in the vicinage of London. At that time, too, there was only one Paddington stage. It was driven by the proprietor, or, rather, tediously dragged, along the clayey road from Paddington to the city, in the morning, and performed its journey in about two hours and a-half, "quick time." It returned to Paddington in the evening, within three hours from its leaving the city; this was deemed "fair time," considering the necessity for precaution against the accidents of "night travelling!"

Twelfth Day resumed.

Some notion may be formed of the great revelries in all ranks of society, on Twelfth night, from this fact that in 1622 the gentlemen of Grays Inn, to make an end of Christmas, shot off all the chambers they had borrowed from the tower, being as many as filled four carts. The king (James I.) awakened with the noise started out of bed and cried "Treason! Treason!" The court was raised and almost in arms, the earl of Arundel with his sword drawn ran to the bed chamber to rescue the king's person, and the city was in an uproar.*

On January 6th, 1662, being Twelfth night, Mr. Evelyn records in his diary as follows:-This evening, according to custom, his majesty (Charles II.) opened the revels of that night by throwing the dice himself in the privy chamber, where was a table set on purpose, and lost his £100 (the year before he won £1500). The ladies also played very deep. I came away when the duke of Ormond had won about £1000 and left them still at passage, cards, &c., at other tables: both there and at the groom porter's, observing the wicked folly and monstrous excess of passion amongst some losers; sorry I am that such a wretched custom as play to that excess should be countenanced in a court which ought to be an example to the rest of the kingdom." Passage.

This game, called in French Passe dir, was played with dice, is still a military game, and mentioned by the late Capt. Grose as "A camp game with three dice and doublets making up ten or more, to pass or win; any other chances lose." It is more largely described, in the "Complete Gamester, 1680," thus:-"Passage is a game at dice to be played at but by two, and it is performed with three dice. The caster throws continually till he hath thrown doublets under ten, and then he is out and loseth, or doublets above ten, and then he passeth and wins." The stock or fund, as also the place where the game is played, is called the Pass-bank. †

On Twelfth Day the Carnival at Rome begins, and generally continues until the ensuing Lent. This celebratad amusement is described by Lady Morgan, in " Italy," as follows:

Nichols's Progresses, James I. iv, 751. † Nares.

The Carnival commences on Twelfth

day; but its public festivities are reserved for the last week or ten days. Formerly, they commenced with an execution, a criminal being reserved for the purpose. But this custom Cardinal Gonsalvi, to his great honour, abolished. The Carnival holds out some most favorable traits of the actual condition of the Italians; for, if the young and profligate abuse its days of indulgence, a large portion of the middle and inferior classes are exhibited to public observation in the touching and respectable aspect of domestic alliance and family enjoyment; which under all laws, all religions, and all governments, those classes best preserve. A group of three generations frequently presents itself, crowded into an open carriage, or ranged on hired chairs along the Corso, or towering emulously one above the other in galleries erected near the starting-post of the course; taking no other part in the brilliant tumult than as the delighted spectators of a most singular and amusing scene. For several days before the beginning of these festivities, "the city of the dead" exhibits the agitation, bustle, and hurry of the living. The shops are converted into wardrobes; whole streets are lined with masks and dominos, the robes of sultans and jackets of pantaloons; canopies are suspended, balconies and windows festooned with hangings and tapestry; and scaffolds are erected for the accommodation of those who have not the interest to obtain admission to the houses and palaces along the

whole line of the Corso.

The

At the sound of the cannon, which, fired from the Piazza di Venezia, each day announce the commencement of the deserted, and the Corso's long and narrow amusements, shops are closed, palaces defile teems with nearly the whole of the hibited is truly singular, and, for the first Roman population. The scene then exday or two, infinitely amusing. whole length of the street, from the Porta del Popolo to the foot of the Capitol, a distance of considerably more than a mile, is patrolled by troops of cavalry; the windows and balconies are crowded from the first to the sixth story by spectators and actors, who from time to time descend and take their place and parts in the procession of carriages, or among the maskers on foot. Here and there the monk's crown, and cardinal's red skull-cap, are seen peeping among heads not more fantastic than their own. The chairs and